S%V.;*:^[^V^,'•■■!,;v.. -,. ; ;, '' 













THE CRIME OF SILENCE 



/ 



THE MARDEN BOOKS 



EFFICIENCY BOOKS 

Woman and Home $1.25 

Keeping Fit. 1.25 

The Joys of Living. 1.25 

Training for Efficiency, 1.25 

The Exceptional Employee. 1.00 

The Progressive Business Man. 1.25 

INSPIRATIONAL BOOKS 

Getting On. $1.00 

Self-Investment. 1.00 

Every Man a King. 1.00 

The Optimistic Life. 1.00 

Rising in the World. 1.00 

Be Good to Yourself. 1.00 

Pushing to the Front. 1.00 

Peace, Power, and Plenty. 1.00 

The Secret of Achievement. 1.00 

He Can Who Thinks He Can. 1.00 

The Miracle of Right Thought. 1.00 

The Young Man Entering Business. 1.00 

SUCCESS BOOKLETS 

Per volume, 50 cents. 
Character. Personality. 

Cheerfulness. Opportunity. 

Good Manners. An Iron Will. 

Power of Personality. 

SPECIAL BOOKLETS 

Success Nuggets. $ .50 

I Had a Friend. .50 

Hints for Young Writers. .50 

Sold by 
PHYSICAL CULTURE PUBLISHING CO. 



THE CRIME OF 
SILENCE 

BY 

ORISON SWETT HARDEN, M.D. 



THE JOYS OF 



AND OTHER LIFE BUILDING WORKS. 



NEW YORK 

PHYSICAL CULTURE PUBLISHING CO. 
FLATIRON BUILDING 






\^^X^ 



Copyright, 1915, 
By orison SWETT MARDEN 



4i— 

©CI,A4113U' 

AUG 25 1915 
Ot^^ ( 



Ol0 

THOSE WHO DO NOT KNOW 

The multitudes of young men and young women who are 
ignorant of the 'perils to which their lack of sex training 
may expose them; the victims of wild oats sowing who 
are now reaping the frightful harvest in untold mental 
and physical agonies as a result of such ignorance; 
thd millions of fathers and mothers whose crim- 
inal silence on this most important of all subjects 
may ruin the lives of the sons and daughters for 
whose happiness they would make any sacri- 
fice; to my unknown friends scattered all 
over the world whom I have never met, but - 
who, I feel, are one with me in the 
desire to give the ivorld a lift for 
the things worth while, this little 
book is affectionately dedicated by 
The Authoe 



PREFACE 

How shall we teach sex hygiene? How 
shall we safeguard our children from possible 
sex perversion or contamination? How shall 
we best forewarn and forearm them so that 
they may transmit the familjj^ blood without 
contamination or impurity, may pass the fam- 
ily name down to their children as pure as they 
received it? 

Never before were those questions upper- 
most in the minds of so many fathers, mothers, 
preachers, teachers and people of all classes as 
to-day. 

We are slowly awakening to their tremen- 
dous import. The age-old crime^of^lence in 
regard to sex matters is at last being broken. 
In the light of modern progressive thought it 
seems incomprehensible that society should so 
long have conspired to pass over in silence this 
vital subject, thus, year after year, exposing 
millions of our youths to the frightful dangers 
flowing from ignorance of it. Probably the 



xii Preface 



statement of a recent physician writer in this 
connection is not exaggerated. "Pick out any 
ten men you meet in the street/* he says, ''and 
at least nine will be suffering from some sort 
of present or past immorality." 
/ All the wa rs of histo ry have not caused any- 
1 thing like the number of tragedies which have 
1 been caused by this criminal silence. There is 
\jiothing so much needed to-day as non-pruri- 
ent, scientific sexual instruction. 

''If you have been upon these waters twenty- 
five years," said a young man to the captain of 
a steamer, "you must know every rock and 
sandbank in the river." "No, I don't," was 
the reply, "but I know where the deep water 
is." 

It is not so much the object of the author of 
this book to make a chart of the dangers to be 
avoided in life's voyage as to mark out a course 
that is sane and safe. 

It is sent forth as a beacon, in the hope that 
it will be the means of guiding voyagers away 
from the sex rocks and reefs on which unnum- 
bered j^ouths have been wrecked in the past be- 
cause they were not safeguarded by the light 
of self-knowledge. 



i 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

,/l Purity is Power 1 

II The Crime of Silence 19 

III ''Dangerous Passing" 51 

IV "A Little Devil to Play With'' . . 63 

V White Slavery and the Child Woman . 81 

VI How THE Slave Mart is Supplied . . 98 

VII "Smuggling Poisoned Goods'' . . . .115 

VIII Mothers and Daughters 133 

IX Perilous 'Tleasures" , 150 

X Fathers and Sons 166 

XI Sowing Wild Oats and the Harvest . . 187 

XII Medical Quacks AND Lost Manhood . . 211 

XIII How TO Regain Your Manhood . . . 230 

Why *'The Unfortunate Woman?" . . 250 

Perils of the New Freedom .... 275 

Woman's Cruelty to Woman .... 286 

The Damnable Double Standard . . 305 



THE CRIME OF SILENCE 

CHAPTER I 

PURITY IS POWER 

My strength is as the strength of ten. 
Because my heart is pure. — -Alfred Tennyson. 

Virtue could see to do what Virtue would 

By her own radiant light, though sun and moon 

Were in the flat sea sunk. — John Milton. 

A LEADING lawyer and public official in the 
Sandwich Islands overturned a lighted lamp 
on his hand and was amazed to find that the 
blazing oil caused no paiuo On examination 
he was horrified to discover that he was a leper. 

In its early stages moral leprosy causes no 
physical pain. On the contrary, its insidious- 
ness lies in the very fact that it gives its victim 
gross, sensual pleasure. While titillating the 
lower animal nature, it gradually tends to 
numb the spiritual, to blot out the image of the 
Divine in man. As opium deadens the physi- 



The Crime of Silence 



cal sensibilities, so sexual impurity, while 
treacherously undermining the body, deadens 
the moral sensibilities, and soothes the wrong- 
doer into unconsciousness of his peril. 

There is a profound philosophy in the lines 
which Tennyson puts into the mouth of the 
stainless young knight, Sir Galahad, — 

My strength is as the strength of ten. 
Because my heart is pure. 

Purity strengthens ; impurity weakens. 
One is constructive; the other is destructive. 
Purity builds up; impurity tears down. 

Purity is power because it means integrity 
of thought, integrity of conduct. It means 
wholeness. The impure man can not be a 
great power because he can not thoroughly be- 
lieve in himself when conscious that he is rotten 
in any part of his nature. Impurity works 
like a leaven: it affects everything in a man. 
The very consciousness that impurity is work- 
ing within him robs him of power. He may 
prosper for a time, but there is a canker at work 
in his nature which ultimately destroys him. 

In every realm of life, — the physical, moral, 
mental, intellectual, — there is no more practi- 



Purity Is Power 



cal, necessary, health-preserving, success-assur- 
ing command than ''Keep thyself pure." It is 
the youth's greatest commandment. Do not 
listen to those who tell you that "vice is a neces- 
sity." Nothing is a necessity that is wrong. 
All wickedness is weakness. Vice and vigor 
have nothing whatever in common. Purity is 
strength, health, power, character. It is the 
divinity in man. ''Blessed are the pure in 
heart for they shall see God" should have been 
translated "for they do see God." 

It is only the pure in heart who can see God, 
or the divine in man. "A pure heart is the 
end of all religion, and the beginning of divin- 
ity." Impurity, on the other hand, forms a 
scale upon our eyes, covers the spiritual vision 
with a curtain, blinding us to all that is pure, 
clean and lovely. It draws a veil between man 
and his Creator. It shuts the door between its 
victim and his God, so that he no longer sees 
or appreciates divine qualities. 

Purity of life means, for man no less than 
for woman, physical and moral health. It 
means efficiency, harmony of faculties, in- 
creased self-confidence. It means courage as 
lagainst cowardice, a positive as against a nega- 



4 The Crime or Silence 

tive mind. It means initiative, force, instead 
of imitation, dependence. 

No one not familiar with the facts knows the 
fearful mental effects of the violation and 
abuse of the sex function. There is no other 
thing that so affects the mind as the conscious- 
ness that there is something wrong with the 
sex life. Thousands of people have com- 
mitted suicide because of the mental depression 
caused by the consciousness of contracting a 
sexual disease which they thought incurable. 
A young man once came to me for advice with 
a revolver in his pocket, and told me that un- 
less I could give him encouragement or tell 
him where he could get relief he would end it 
all then and there. 

Everything in the human organism shows 
that purity, cleanliness and right living in every 
form are not only entirely normal and natural, 
but are absolutely imperative to human integ- 
rity, for everywhere that sexual impurity has 
been introduced into society, a terrible curse 
has followed. Demoralization, deterioration, 
tragedy and death of all that is highest and 
noblest in humanity are its legitimate fruits. 
Immorality, impurity, always and everywhere 



Purity Is Power 



blights, blasts, deadens. It is the great curse 
of the race. 

On the other hand, to be superbly sexed, 
without hereditary taint or acquired sex abuse 
or misuse, means more than anything else to 
the individual. Nothing else will contribute 
so much to mental virihty, to creative power of 
the brain, as consciousness of sexual integrity 
and sexual virility, which awakens, enriches, 
and vitalizes all the faculties, and develops the 
creative energy which renews the whole nature. 

It is the law that any human function whose 
normal, direct exercise is for any reason denied 
will be transmuted through other channels into 
general life force. This creative force, which 
most people squander and wickedly waste in 
beastly indulgences, in the virtuous man is 
transmuted into brain power, soul power. It 
is the very flowering out of life. Men who lead 
a pure, clean life are infinitely more virile, more 
magnetic, more forceful, more productive, 
more buoyant, more spiritual than those who 
squander their creative energy and waste their 
vitality in dissipation. 

Purity means virility and is the very spirit 
of the master book, the master painting, the 



6 The Crime of Silence 

master creation, in every department of human 
activity. It is this sex virihty which does the 
most superb thing in every line of human en- 
deavor. It is this that sparkles in the life. 
It is the secret of spontaneity, of buoyancy. It 
is the very soul of joy and gladness. 

Intellectual integrity is impossible without 
moral integrity. If there is any disintegration 
or demoralizing influence operating anywhere 
in the nature, weakness is inevitable. No one 
can live a life which is sapping his vitality, 
which is running counter to the highest thing 
in him, and still express his maximum of pos- 
sible power. 

''How many great minds, irremediably de- 
stroyed by misguided voluptuousness," says M. 
Jean Finot, ''are cut down before having ex- 
pended for the human race one-tenth of their 
knowledge." 

The same author, in his "Problems of the 
Sexes," quoting Sainte-Beuve, in deploring 
this waste of creative power caused by sexual 
dissipation, says: "Who shall say how, in a 
great city, at certain hours of the evening and 
the night, there are periodically exhausted 
treasures of genius, of beautiful and beneficent 






Purity Is Power 



works, or fruitful fancies ? One in whom, un- 
der rigid continence, a sublime creation of mind 
was about to unfold, will miss the hour, the 
passage of the star, the kindhng moment which 
will nevermore be found. Another, inclined 
by nature to kindness, to charity, and to a 
charming tenderness, will become cowardly, in- 
ert, or even unfeeling. This character, which 
was almost fixed, will be dissipated and vola- 
tile." 

Upon the proper use and conservation of 
sexual force the progress of civilization itself 
depends. All history shows that just in pro- 
portion as the sex instinct is kept sacred, pure, 
and the life essence properly used and con- 
verted into creative, productive power, does a 
nation reach a high state of civilization. 
Wherever this instinct becomes generally per- 
verted, as it did in ancient Rome, people be- 
come devitalized, lose their physical and men- 
tal stamina, and rapidly deteriorate. Where 
it is protected by virtue and purity of life, the 
nation rises in the scale of civilization ; where it 
is abused, perverted, the nation sinks to the 
level of low-flying ideals. 

In the last analysis of success, the main- 



8 The Crime of Silence 

spring of achievement must rest in the strength 
of a man's vitaKty; for without a stock of 
health equal to great emergencies and consis- 
tent longevity even the greatest ambition is 
comparatively powerless. Dissipation and im- 
pure living steal the energies, weaken the na- 
ture, lower the standards, blur the ideals, un- 
dermine thei ambition, and lessen the whole vi- 
tality and power of a man. 

This is true not only of physical, but also of 
mental impurity, for nothing is truer than that 
''To be carnally minded (sensually minded) 
is death." There are multitudes of people 
who break the seventh commandment mentally, 
who are injured as much as if they had broken 
it physically. Mental debauch is in some re- 
spects more disastrous in its effects than phys- 
ical debauch. Lascivious longings, emotions 
that run riot, uncontrolled, are most demoraliz- 
ing to the character. Some of the worst nerve 
diseases are really nothing but sexual neurosis, 
brought on by lascivious imaginings, unlawful 
mental revelings. Those whom we may well 
call sexual neurotics are unbalanced, selfish, 
usually cold-blooded, and lack all sense of pro- 



I 



Purity Is Power 9 



portion. They are driven under impulse, com- 
mitting all sorts of criminal deeds. 

The mind should be kept as unstained as 
the body. Every part of the being should be 
regarded as too holy to tamper with, too sacred 
to abuse, for the integrity or purity of each 
part of one's organism has a direct bearing 
upon the integrity, purity, and efficiency of 
every other part. 

If a person who has always previously been 
honest conmiits one contemptible, dishonorable 
act, the texture of his entire character seems 
to be changed thereafter. In a far more seri- 
ous degree is this true in regard to the sex in- 
stinct. It is not like a mistake or a blunder, 
however serious, that may be made in any other 
direction. This would not materially change 
the hfe structure; but, when one deliberately 
violates his sex instinct, the tainted leaven never 
ceases to work until it permeates the whole 
man. No human being has ever been great 
enough to practice immorality, to tamper with 
his sexual nature, without suffering very seri- 
ous mental and moral deterioration. 

Impurity, because of its blighting, deaden- 



10 The Crime of Silence 

ing influence upon the mental as well as the 
moral faculties, very seriously interferes with 
one's success in life. Not only does it under- 
mine self-confidence, but it also takes the 
bloom from life, robs it of that buoyancy, 
spontaneity and effervescence which are the 
products of virtuous living, pure thoughts, a 
clean mind in a clean body. 

Sexual indulgence not only saps the physi- 
cal, the mental and the moral vitality; but it 
also takes the spring out of life, the force, the 
resilience. It destroys freshness, enthusiasm, 
the impulse to do and to be one's best. 

A Roman emperor used to have the right 
hand cut off of every prisoner who was cap- 
tured in war so that the men could not fight 
again ; but this same mutilation also destroyed 
their productive power so that they were not 
as useful citizens as before. Sexual vice is 
more cruel than this pagan emperor. It not 
only cuts off the right hand of its victim's ef- 
ficiency, but it also murders the man in him, 
leaving nothing but the shell of his former 
beauty and grand possibilities. 

The human beings who have attained to the 
highest and most glorified perfection have 



Purity Is Power 11 

}een those in whom sex integrity had been pre- 
served in all its purity. It is man's relation to 
divinity which paints the best part of the pic- 
ture, which writes the divinest thing in author- 
ship and in poetry. It is the sublimest part of 
genius, of creative energy. It is that which 
sparkles in the eye and is that which furnishes 
the sweetness and light in the lover's glances. 
It is a source of the sweetest thing in friend- 
ship. It is that which gives virility, vigor, 
strength and sweetness to human acts and 
human endeavor. 

Men are rnost efficient, most vigorous, when 
they think most of themselves, when they have 
the greatset respect for themselves, and we are 
all so constituted that we can not respect our- 
selves unless we do right. 

A man is a giant when he can look himself 
and the world in the face Avithout wincing; but 
he is a weakling when he is conscious that his 
self-respect is gone, that the ermine of his char- 
acter is soiled, polluted. He has a fearful 
sense of mutilation and shame, of lost power. 
Many a man has been kept from doing a 
giant's work because of the consciousness of 
wrong-doing, which has shorn him of his power ; 



12 The Crime of Silence 

so that, considering it from the most selfish 
standpoint alone, impurity generates inferior- 
ity, weakness, paralysis of energy, the killing 
of ambition, the beastializing of the ideal, the 
lowering of the moral and physical standards, 
— in short, the loss of manhood, the loss of 
womanhood. 

Purity is the corner-stone, the very founda- 
tion of character; for, without purity, there 
can be no sterling quality, and without quality 
there can be no superiority. 

Even the lower animals have no respect for 
the impure man, the loose hver. F. C. Bos- 
tock, the celebrated trainer of wild animals, 
says, ''In some curious, incomprehensible way, 
wild animals know instinctively whether men 
are addicted to bad habits. It is one of the 
many problems that are beyond human under- 
standing. For those who are in the least in- 
clined to drink, or who live a loose life, a wild 
animal has neither fear nor respect. He de- 
spises them with all the contempt of his nature 
and recognizes neither their authority nor their 
superiority. If a man has begun to take just 
a little intoxicating liquor or has deviated from 
the straight road, animals will discover it long 



II 



Purity Is Power 13 

before his fellowmen. The quaUty in the 
trainer which dominates the animal nature 
within himself is precisely the quality which 
dominates the animal he trains. If he yields 
to the brute within him, no matter how little, 
his perfect poise and self-mastery are gone and 
the keen instinct of the wild beast recognizes 
this instantly. Brutes seem to understand 
man's degradation to their level, and his hf e is 
in danger every moment he is in their cage.'' 

An impure man is never out of danger. He 
is perpetually risking his life in a den of wild 
beasts which he harbors within. Nothing is so 
pernicious ; nothing will so quickly undermine 
the mental, the physical, and the moral life, 
as impure practices, vicious habits. We all 
know how rapidly those who live impure lives 
bum out and deteriorate physically and age 
prematurely. Impurity is decay. Impurity 
is death. 

Multitudes manage to get along in compara- 
tive comfort and many have even achieved 
great success in spite of painful bodily afflic- 
tions ; but, as physicians well know, when there 
is anything wrong with the sexual life, it af- 
fects the mind even more than the body. Many 



14 The Crime of Silence 

impure men have gone to insane asylums, have 
committed suicide, or have been so afflicted with 
worry, mental depression, and despondency 
that they have not been able to do any effective 
work. 

I have known a girl (and there are multi- 
tudes of similar cases), who stood very high in 
her community, a conscientious church worker, 
who became so completely transformed in a 
single year, after she had been betrayed and 
abandoned by a man she loved and trusted, 
that it did not seem possible she could be the 
same human being. No other sin could have 
wrought such terrific changes in her nature in 
so brief a time. 

There is something about the sexual instinct 
which strikes at the very root of our nature, the 
very marrow of our being. It is the very es- 
sence of character; and, when this instinct is 
preserved in all its integrity, the integrity of 
absolute purity, when the sexual life is kept 
wholesome, healthy and robust, the whole life 
blossoms out in beauty and glory, but when it 
is perverted, abused, or misused, when its 
sacredness is gone, everything else seems to go 
with it, 



Purity Is Power 15 

A prominent writer says, ''If young persons 
poison their bodies and corrupt their minds 
with vicious courses, no lapse of time, after a 
reform, is likely to restore them to physical 
soundness and the soul purity of their earlier 
days." 

The sexual taint seems to be indelible. Not 
even religion is able to wipe it entirely out, for 
the bitter memory of past excesses haunts the 
individual clear to his grave; the horrible pic- 
ture mocks one even at the point of death. 
We can not tell why this is, but it would appear 
that Nature herself takes revenge for the vio- 
lation of the sex instinct, implanted in man for 
the continuance of the race. 

Many people seem to think that if their acts 
are pure and clean, so far as the public is con- 
cerned, it does not matter what they do pri- 
vately. The privacy of the deed has nothing 
to do with the results to ourselves. A shepherd 
once saw an eagle soar out from a crag. It 
flew majestically up far into the sky, but by 
and by became unsteady and began to waver 
and wobble in its flight. First one wing 
dropped, then the other, and at length the poor 
bird fell to the ground. The shepherd sought 



16 The Crime of Silence 



the fallen bird and found that a little serpent 
had fastened itself upon it while resting on the 
crag. Unseen, unfelt, by the eagle, the ser- 
pent crawled in through its feathers, and while 
the proud monarch was sweeping through the 
air the reptile's fangs were thrust into its flesh, 
poisoning its blood, and bringing it reeling to 
the earth. It is the story of many a life. 
Some secret sin has long been eating its way 
into the heart, and at last the proud life lies 
soiled and dishonored in the dust. 

Without purity there can be no lasting 
greatness. Vice honeycombs the physical 
strength and destroys also the moral fiber. 
Now and again the community is shocked and 
startled when some man of note topples with a 
crash to sudden ruin and death. Yet the cause 
of the moral collapse is not sudden in its opera- 
tion. There has been a slow undermining of 
virtue, a gradual poisoning of the very life cen- 
ters going on for years. Then, perhaps, in 
an hour when honor, truth or honesty is 
brought to a crucial test, the weakened char- 
acter gives way and there is an appalling com- 
mercial or social crash which too often finds 
an echo in the revolver shot of the suicide. 



Purity Is Power 17 

There never was a more beautiful prayer 
than that of the poor, soiled, broken-hearted 
psalmist in his hour of shame and repentance, — 
"Create in me a clean heart." ''Who shall as- 
cend into the hill of the Lord, who shall stand 
in His holy place? He that hath clean hands 
and a pure heart." There are thousands of 
men in this country to-day who would cut off 
their right hands to be free from the stain, the 
I poison of impurity with which they became 
tainted in youth. 

It is not a figure of speech to say ^'Purity is 
power." It is literally true. Purity is the 
very essence of our being, of forcefulness, of 
masterfulness. 

There is nothing else which will whittle away 
the life quite so rapidly as indulgence in sexual 
vice. When a man is guilty of this sin all other 
bad things seem to rush to its aid to help pull 
him down. We sometimes see a tragic illus- 
tration of its destroying power in the case of 
the youth who is sent away from home to col- 
lege. Overwhelmed by his new-found freedom 
he becomes sexually contaminated, plunges 
into other excesses, and in an incredibly short 
time goes down to ruin and death. 



18 The Crime of Silence 

The impure age very rapidly. It is impos- 
sible to dissipate, especially in sexual vice, and 
keep young. It is well known that the women 
of the street are very short-lived, — that they 
only average four or five years in their miser- 
able business. The violation of the most sa-i 
cred thing in them so demoralizes and devital- 
izes their whole being, physically, mentally,^ 
morally, that the very consciousness of having 
killed the most precious thing they ever pos- 
sessed rapidly grinds away their lives. Some 
of them age more in a single year than a girl 
who lives a pure life does in ten. 

Purity is not only a health-preserver, but it 
is also a youth-preserver, a life-prolonger-.^ 
The pure in heart realize the Scriptural prom- 
ise,^ — ''His flesh shall be fresher than a child's..^ 
He shall return to the days of his youth." 

Oh, no ! we live our lives again ; 

For, warmly touched or coldly dim, 
The pictures of the past remain: 

Man's works shall follow him. 

— J. G. Whittier. 



CHAPTER II 

THE CRIME OF SILENCE 

Self -reverence, self-knowledge, self-control. 
These three alone lead life to sovereign power. 

— Alfred Tennyson. 

Virtue is an angel, but she is a blind one and must ask of 
knowledge to show her the pathway that leads to her goal. 

— Horace Mann. 

I "How it happened I can hardly under- 
( stand," said a well-known man to me in confi- 
; dence, "for when a boy I was very inquisitive 
and eager for information on every possible 
i subject of inquiry; but, until I was more than 
twelve years old, I do not think that I had 
I given even a passing thought to sexual matters. 
I I had heard a few "smutty" stories, it is true, 
I but they had no suggestive significance of las- 
civiousness to me, and were interesting or not 
only in proportion as they were merely intel- 
lectually witty. Perhaps my escape was 
largely due to the fact that, when active, I was 
so full of life and so engrossed in sport that 

19 



20 The Crime of Silence 

there was no chance to talk to me about any- 
thing besides the game at issue, when I was 
playing, for I played with all my might and 
gave my playmates all they could attend to 
to prevent my beating them. When I was not 
active physically, I at once plunged into some 
book, for I was a great reader and could so con- 
centrate my mind that I could read undisturbed 
with seven brothers and sisters playing around 
me, so long as they did not touch me. 

''But one day a sudden, violent thunder 
shower drove me to shelter with two compan- 
ions under an old shed, where we had to remain 
about two hours. The conversation drifted 
from one thing to another until one of the boys 
asked me if I had ever practiced self-abuse, 
calling it by a name common among the young. 
I did not even understand what he meant, and 
told him so ; whereupon he explained his mean- 
ing, and added that I ought to try it, for I did 
not know what a good thing I was missing. 

"Yet, even after this, it was several weeks 
before I did try it, and curiosity rather than 
inclination was the impelling motive. Of 
course I repeated the act, but soon realized that 
in some way I did not comprehend it was in- 



The Crime of Silence 21 

juring me and reducing my abounding vivac- 
ity, so I decided to stop it. But somehow I 
did not stop, and then came the most sickening 
and terrifying consciousness I have ever ex- 

j perienced, as it suddenly dawned upon me that 
I was in the remorseless grip of a cruel habit. 
But I continued, though I felt much as the 

! dying western stage driver must have felt when 
he cried out, in the delirium of fever, 'I'm on 

I the down grade, and I can't reach the brake!' 

' ''I had had the best of religious as well as 

; intellectual training, and I remember thinking, 
one day, to myself, 'Your soul is no longer 

( your own ! It is no use for you to talk of such 
things as God and heaven, for they are not for 
you! You are worse off than a slave, — worse 
off than if you were chained, as St. Paul said, 
to the body of death, — for you are by your own 

! deeds dragging out the most miserable of lives 
and seem bound to go down to the most miser- 
able of graves. Is this all you are good for? 
Is this what you were created for? No, I was 
born for better things, and I will not become 
the ghastly victim of this cruel devil that seems 
to possess me now! It was a hard struggle — 
to get and keep my hand on 'the brake,' — but I 



22 The Crime or Silence 



finally won, although I cannot think even now ' 
without a mental shudder of the starless mid- 
night of despair which seemed to be closing 
down upon me." 

If this was the experience of one who drifted 
into this practice solely through curiosity, with- 
out any original temptation of inclination, 
what must have been that of thousands, per- 
haps millions, of others of naturally prurient 
susceptivities? If, struggling against it with 
all his might, he barely escaped, how about 
others of weaker wills who have not become 
alarmed so soon? Where were all the ''guard- 
ians and protectors" of the young that they 
gave him no warning or instruction in 
such matters? — ^where were parents, schools, 
churches, the state, philanthropists, and others 
commonly supposed to be deeply interested in 
the welfare of youth? Think of building a 
powerful locomotive 6y steamship and putting 
it upon the track or the ocean, as the case may 
be, with all steam turned on, but without giving 
the captain any chart or map to sail by, or the 
engineer any idea of the time schedule or the 
meaning of the danger signals along the line! 

''The idea that ignorance is essential to inno- 



The Crime of Silence 23 

cence is happily being exploded," says Dr. Irv- 
ing D. Steinhardt, ''and we physicians are in a 
better position than the laity to speak of the 
wreckage and disaster that result from igno- 
rance and neglect of proper instruction on sex 
hygiene." 

I know of nothing which has wrecked the 
happiness and lives of more young people than 
our foolish prudery, our criminal silence, re- 
garding the most vital facts of their being, 
facts which underlie the very foundation of so- 
ciety. How little you fathers and mothers 
\ who remain silent on the all-important subject 
I of sex life realize the painful and humiliating 
! experiences, the terrible suffering and wreck- 
I age, which your silence may be laying up for 
your children in the years to come. If you 
I could follow them into the future — follow them 
I to the confessional, to their clergymen, to their 
I physicians, to the operating table ; if you could 
j only hear them years hence pouring into the 
' ears of their priests, their pastors, their doc- 
i tors, the woes of their blighted lives, you would 
j certainly learn a lesson which you would never 
I forget. You would realize that, while it may 
' be difficult for you now to speak on this delicate 



24 The Crime of Silence 

subject to your children, your silence is putting 
a terrible premium on their ignorance, a pre- 
mium which may cost them untold future suf- 
fering, which may bring tragedy into their 
homes when they marry, and may entail disease 
worse than death upon their children. 

We are only just beginning to recognize and 
appreciate the tremendous modifying power of 
the sex element in the growing boy and girl, 
the body-changing, mind-changing, character- 
molding influence of the sexual organs. 

Accidents or surgical operations resulting in 
the destruction of the sexual glands in the boy, 
say of ten or twelve years of age or a httle 
older, cause radical changes in everything 
which marks sex distinction. The voice be- 
comes thin and squeaky and the muscles grow 
flabby and soft ; the chest instead of developing 
becomes narrow, the shoulders often slope and 
the mind loses its virility. In other words, the 
boy becomes mentally as well as physically 
emasculated. He has lost his stamina and the 
very characteristics which mark the strong man 
and he becomes feminine. In fact, if he were 
dressed like a girl he would pass for one, but a 
very weak, characterless one. 



The Crime of Silence 25 

Equally radical changes take place in the 
girl who loses her ovaries. Her fine, delicate 
feminine characteristics begin to disappear, and 
she takes on the very masculine qualities which 
the emasculated youth loses. Her physique, 
her muscles, her voice become masculine, 
heavy, coarse. She often takes on an enor- 
mous amount of fM, and in fact completely 
loses her comely feminine form. And she, just 
as the boy in girls' clothes would pass for a girl, 
in male attire would pass for a man, but a very 
inferior man. 

In short, the emasculated boy loses his viril- 
ity and mascuhnity and' the emasculated girl 
her femininity and attractiveness ; each loses the 
peculiar charm and distinction of sex. ^---^x^ 

The unfortunate thing is that the emascu- 
lated male is neither a man nor a woman, nor 
the emasculated female either a woman or a 
man. x^ Each develops weakened characteris- 
tics of the opposite sex.^. 

Can any other knowledge then be half so 
important as this knowledge of oneself, of one's 
nature, which makes one what he or she is, a 
knowledge which may make all the difference 
between a mongrel, a half animal and half 



26 The Crime of Silence 

human being, and a magnificent man or a 
superb woman I 

The time will come when to keep such 
knowledge away from a boy or girl will be con- 
sidered not only cruel but criminal. The only 
possible way of improving the race and of pre- 
venting untold misery and horrible tragedies 
caused by sex wastage, sexual abuse, is through 
proper instruction of the youth. 

There is no other subject a hundredth part 
so important to youths as that of the sex in- 
stinct and the relations of the sexes, about 
which parents have hitherto preserved such 
foolish silence. They have been careful to 
teach their children in religious matters; they 
have been particular about their going to 
church and to Sunday School, about their men- 
tal development, what th€y study and what 
they read; they have been anxious for them 
to associate with cultured people in order that 
they might acquire good breeding, but concern- 
ing the great facts of their sexual life, facts 
which speak so loudly in their nature, which 
clamor so persistently and insistently for rec- 
ognition, they have had nothing to say. Prac- 
tically all their children have learned regarding 



The Crime of Silence 27 

this subject is by inference, from vulgar jokes 
and innuendoes, all sorts of distorted informa- 
tion which they pick up from questionable 
sources (which only arouses a morbid and most 
vicious curiosity) , but not a particle of instruc- 
tion have they received from the people they 
respect and revere and to whom they have a 
right to look for safeguarding instruction. 

I know many parents who, through some 
fatally mistaken idea of modesty, lack the 
moral courage frankly to tell their children the 
truth about their sex nature, and who try to 
get teachers or friends to broach the subject to 
them. Do you realize, my parent friends, that 
when you delegate this sacred duty to others 
you are weakening that most precious^of all 
bonds between child and parent, — that unques- 
tioned confidence and sweet trust which Nature 
has implanted in the heart of the child, who in 
his tenderest years looks up to his parents as 
authorities on all matters? Isn't it infinitely 
better to put aside your false modesty and teach 
your children the true and beautiful meaning 
of sex than to hazard their future happiness 
and efficiency, or to hear in after years that bit- 
ter cry which has gone up from many a young 



28 The Crime of Silence 

soul in extremity of anguish: "Oh, why did 
not my parents tell me the truth about myself ! 
Why did they not hang out the danger signal 
upon the sex rocks and reefs before it was too 
late!'^ 

Isn't it a thousand times better that your 
children should learn the truth about them- 
selves from those who love them as their own 
lives, than to get a confused idea of it from the 
vicious insinuations and vile suggestions of 
those who associate with them in the street or at 
school? 

Some parents flatter themselves that their 
children are safe in private schools, where only 
the best boys and girls are supposed to be ; but 
in most private schools, as in most other schools 
and colleges, sexual demoralization is more or 
less rife. How often it has happened that a 
single sexual pervert has contaminated the 
morals of an entire school, and the pity of it is 
that the harm is usually done before even the 
teachers know of it. The mischief is carried 
on so secretly, the evil is so subtle, the impurity 
leaven is so insidious that the whole character 
is often honeycombed before the teachers or the 
parents find it out. 



The Crime of Silence 29 

Mothers who think it is a terrible thing to 
post children in sex matters, who think that 
they should find out these things themselves, 
little realize how often it happens that their 
own little daughters, even in the primary 
school, or later in private schools or seminaries, 
are already sexually contaminated because of 
their ignorance. 

''Nearly fifteen years in the Juvenile Court 
convinces me," says Judge Benjamin Lindsey, 
"that there is hardly one child out of one hun- 
dred who has reached the age of twelve that 
hasn't come in contact with some sort of sex 
experience, either through vulgar stories or 
that sort of curiosity that is more or less natural 
and to be expected with a growing child. I 
used to think that this was true with more par- 
ticular reference to boys ; but I am convinced — 
as is also the lady assistant judge of this court 
(who has sat with me in girls' cases for more 
than ten years) — that it is almost equally true 
of girls. We are almost constantly having to 
shock mothers with disclosures concerning the 
sex immorality of their daughters because of 
the cases that have to come under the observa- 
tion of the officers of the Juvenile Court," 



30 The Crime or Silence 

This statement of Judge Lindsey's should 
arouse every father and mother to the necessity 
of sex instruction. If you have not properly in- 
structed them, it is always safe to presume that 
your boys and girls, unless very small, have 
picked up a great deal more of information re- 
garding sex matters than you have any idea of. 
Your silence on these matters does not keep 
them innocent of the vulgar, distorted side of 
the sex subject. They get this in spite of you, 
and the pity of it all is that they do not have 
your instruction to neutralize and take the at- 
tractiveness out of this luridly colored infor- 
mation. Unfortunately, there are always hu- 
man brutes who are ready to put into the minds 
of the young all sorts of vile insinuations, half- 
truths, and vicious suggestions, sensual insinu- 
ations, and to put into their hands foul litera- 
ture and lewd pictures. There are always 
those who take pleasure in feeding the curiosity 
of the young upon distorted sex knowledge 
which simply inflames the passions and de- 
velops a morbid imagination. 

Sexual dangers lie largely in the very secrecy 
maintained by those who should give instruc- 
tion on the whole subject. But Nature herself 



The Crime of Silence 31 

will not tolerate ignorance on this matter; she 
forces knowledge regarding it. The imperi- 
ous questioning, the insistent desires, the call of 
awakening passion, of burgeoning youth de- 
mand an explanation. Who is going to give 
this explanation? That rests with you par- 
ents. If you do not give it to them, your chil- 
dren will pick up whatever sex information 
they can, wherever they can, out of your sight 
and hearing. Information thus acquired is 
never clean, pure and wholesome, as it would 
be if it came from the right source, but always 
gross and vulgar, always discolored with low, 
sensual, lecherous suggestion. 

One of the great objections to posting youth 
regarding their sex nature is that it will tend to 
arouse a morbid curiosity. Now I believe, on 
the contrary, that a knowledge of the scientific 
facts, simply, freely and frankly imparted, at 
the right age and with tact, is the only thing 
that will prevent the possibility of morbid curi- 
osity on the subject. Children are only curi- 
ous about that which is concealed. A frank, 
open discussion will dispel any morbid curios- 
ity. It is the hidden truth, .that which is 
clothed in mystery, that arouses curiosity. 



32 The Crime of Silence 

Has it ever occurred to you that your chil- 
dren must think it strange that this wonderful 
subject of sex, which interests them more than 
anything else during their perilous years, is 
one that is never mentioned at home, never so 
much as referred to and that the very reasons 
which brought their father and mother to- 
gether, made them live together as husband 
and wife, are never even referred to? Even 
in homes where parents constantly joke the 
children about their sweethearts and about get- 
ting married, the principles that underlie this 
wonderful, mysterious subject are never ex- 
plained, but unfortunately the sex-conscious- 
ness is morbidly developed, and the young peo- 
ple are left in darkness and ignorance to 
wrestle with their instincts and passions as best 
they can. The boy and the girl feel that they 
must keep their thoughts concealed from every- 
body for whom they have any respect, because 
they never hear those whom they love and ad- 
mire referring to the subject. It is only the 
vicious and the low who will talk about it to 
them. 

Now, when your children ask questions upon 
sex matters, before they have developed a mor- 



The Crime of Silence 33 

bid self -consciousness in regard to the subject, 
why make a mystery of it? Why evade them 
or fill their minds with fables and lies? Why 
not answer them frankly and truthfully ? They 
will find out the truth sooner or later, and will 
then think less of you for having deceived them. 
Furthermore, when they get this information 
from outside, as they are bound to if parents 
refuse to give it to them, father or mother will 
never again be the same confidant as before. 
Your children will gradually drift away, and, 
more or less, estrangement will grow up be- 
tween you. 

Remember that the relation of your child to 
you through its dependent years, when it looks 
up to you in implicit faith, is such that he will 
never again, probably, have the same confi- 
dence in information given by any one else. 
Then is your priceless opportunity to tell him 
the straight truth. To refuse to guide him in 
these impressionable, perilous years is as cruel 
as it would be to let a blind man wander in a 
street which would lead him into a river. 

If you can manage to be such a close confi- 
dant of your boy that he will instinctively and 
naturally come to you with every question 



34 The Crime or Silence 

which troubles him, and always feel free to talk 
over the most intimate relations of his life with 
you, you will have little to fear for his future. 
If you instil into your child's mind, in such a 
way that it will never be eradicated, the idea 
that he should never do anything which he 
would be ashamed to have his mother know all 
about, you have accomplished a wonderful 
thing. 

Most parents have an idea that imparting 
sexual knowledge to children is like brushing 
the bloom from the peach, that it means the 
loss of early innocence. There could not be a 
greater mistake. The whole subject can be so 
handled that it will seem just as natural to get 
instruction on it as on any other. It can be 
treated in so pure and simple a manner that a 
child would regard a filthy reference or low 
joke in connection with it as he would an insult- 
ing jest regarding his mother. 

The main thing in imparting s'ex instruction 
to a boy and girl is to do it in a delicate as well 
as simple way, to avoid coarseness and crudity 
and every possibility of the youthful imagina- 
tion visualizing pictures of sexual sin. 

Many well-meaning writers who are trying 



The Crime of Silence 35 

to help young people to solve their sex prob- 
lems approach the subject in such a round- 
about, mysterious manner that they give the im- 
pression that there really is something to be 
ashamed of, something which must be con- 
cealed. While their motives are admirable, 
they do more harm than good. They make 
the mistake that the majority of grown people 
make, in thinking that children have deep or 
involved thoughts upon the subject. As a 
matter of fact, nothing is farther from the 
truth. Their ideas regarding it are very vague 
and their minds are very easily satisfied; but 
they should be satisfied along the line of truth 
and not of deception. 

Nothing is gained and much is lost in deceiv- 
ing a child or misleading him with fables of the 
stork flying in the window with the baby or the 
angels bringing it down from heaven. Chil- 
dren, as a rule, think of the matter in such 
vague and indefinite terms as are suggested 
in the question which one little fellow asked his 
mother, ''Where was I when there wasn't any 
me?" Now, as it doesn't take very much to 
satisfy such a child's curiosity, why deceive 
him? — why mystify him? — ^why not, in simple, 



36 The Crime of Silence 

chaste language, tell him the truth? It can be 
done in such a delicate way as to satisfy his 
mind, without in the least distressing him or 
robbing him of a particle of his fresh innocence. 
Then, when he gets a little older, when his mind 
can grasp more truth, give him more, but do 
not wait until too late to give this instruction. 
Give it to him a little in advance of his sexual 
development. Then there will be no danger 
of developing a morbid imagination, unchaste 
visualizing. The plain facts, the truth, will 
free the young mind from all morbid curiosity. 
But, if you begin by deceiving him, you have 
got to continue; and, when he hears the truth 
in the wrong way from some one else, he loses 
confidence in you. 

I believe that the mother is the safest link in 
connecting young children with this whole 
mystery of sex. Because of her mother love, 
superior tact, and marvelous instinct, there is 
little danger of her startling or shocking the 
awakening young mind. Men, generally, are 
more awkward in their language. They lack 
that delicacy of approach, that sensitiveness 
of mental touch, that fine intuition which is 



The Crime of Silence 37 

a part of the feminine nature. To children, 
especially when they are still young, there is 
nothing in this world so sacred as their mother. 
What she says carries infinitely more weight 
than what the father or the teacher says. 
When the boy approaches manhood, then the 
father may safely assume the office of confi- 
dant and instructor of his son in these matters, 
but during his very tender years the mother 
should be his guide. 

The mother, in taking advantage of a favor- 
able opportunity when her boy is in the right 
affectionate mood, can tell him the scientific 
facts of sex in such language that no unnat- 
ural suspicion or sensual suggestion will be 
aroused in his mind. Instead he will take the 
whole thing as a matter of course. Perhaps 
one or two little talks may not only save your 
boy from untold misery or the possible wreck- 
age of his whole life, but may bind him to you 
closer than anything else that has ever come 
up between you. He will ever after say to 
himself, in moments of temptation, "My 
mother told me this,'' and it will mean infinitely 
more to him than knowledge obtained from any 



38 The Crime of Silence 

other source. It will bear the stamp of sa- 
credness, of cleanness, of purity, and save him 
many a pitfall. 

Or the whole question may be simply and 
naturally introduced by telling your child of 
the dignity and sacredness of motherhood. 
If a boy is properly instructed in regard to 
this, and a high ideal of womanhood is roused 
in him, he can safely be given the scientific 
facts regarding his physical being, and the 
natural, normal generation and reproduction 
of human life. 

The mother can explain the facts of mater- 
nity, the mystery of it all, as no one else can. 
Let her impress the boy with the sanctity of 
motherhood, and the awful sacrifice which 
every mother makes in bringing a child into the 
world. Let her teach him that her very suf- 
fering so intensifies the mother's love for her 
child that she would gladly give her life to pro- 
tect it. This will strengthen his love for his 
mother and build up his ideal of the holiness, 
the beauty and the wonder of it all. 

Beautiful sex lessons can be taught chil- 
dren through botany and zoology. It is not a 
very difficult matter to teach boys and girls 



The Ceime of Silence 39 

about the marvelous provision made by Nature 
for the reproduction and perpetuation of life 
in plants, in fishes, in the lower animals, and in 
human beings. Begin with the egg, the origin 
of the chicken, or the fish, the metamorphosis 
of the insect, and the fertilization of plants. 
All this will lead up easily and naturally to 
human reproduction and the natural instinct 
of all animals for pairing, with the object of 
the perpetuation of the species, and how this 
pairing in the lower forms of life foreshadows 
the home. 

The introduction of this subject will give 
the intelligent mother an opportunity to instil 
into the mind of her cliildren lessons from the 
evolution of life and the progress of the world. 
She can go back to the time when there were no 
human beings on the earth, and show her little 
ones how our highest specimens of manhood 
have gradually been evolved from animal 
forms — so low^ as to be scarcely distinguishable 
from vegetable organisms. She can explain 
how man has been foreshadowed in other forms 
of life and how Nature for millions of years 
has been evolving higher and higher organisms 
up to the highest human type of the present. 



40 The Crime or Silence 

She can picture to them how man has cHmbed 
from the Hottentots to the Gladstones, the 
Washingtons, the Lincolns, and fill their young 
imagination with all the wonders of evolution. 

Where the mother has not been scientifically 
instructed in these things herself, she can give 
her children all the facts she knows in regard 
to the subject in a sweet, natural way which 
will forewarn and safeguard them from a thou- 
sand perilous experiences. When they are 
older, especially if the home is in a city or town, 
where they have the advantage of a public 
library, text books, giving elementary instruc- 
tion on physiology, anatomy and kindred sub- 
jects may be given them. Later, when their 
minds are thus prepared, they can be intro- 
duced to the plain truths of sex physiology, sex 
anatomy and sex hygiene, as presented by the 
best authorities. 

While giving this sex instruction and infor- 
mation the whole object should be to enlarge 
the children's horizon, to uplift their ideas of 
Nature, of law and of religion, while at the 
same time instilling into their young minds the 
wonder, the miracle, the sacredness of the mar- 



The Crime of Silence 41 

velous works of God, especially of the powers 
locked up within themselves. 

Many of you fathers and mothers will say 
that the very suggestion that you talk over sex 
matters with your children is repulsive, that 
these are things that should not be thought of 
by the young, to say nothing of talking them 
over with them ; that the discussion of this sub- 
ject would only fill their minds with forbidden 
thoughts. But let me tell you that there is 
not a thousandth part the risk or danger in tell- 
ing your boys and girls the entire facts of their 
own sexual life and the miracle of reproduction 
that there is in silence and secrecy. Indeed, a 
pure and scientific knowledge of those impor- 
tant facts is a protection against evil, against 
morbid curiosity and forbidden thoughts. It 
is ignorance not sex facts but imagined sex mat- 
ters that are dangerous, perilous; knowledge 
means protection, safety. 

Do not make the mistake that so many par- 
ents seem to commit in, taking ignorance for 
purity. Purity is in constant danger unless 
it is protected by the sort of knowledge that 
will safeguard it. Our mothers are pure, our 



42 The Crime of Silence 

wives are pure, but it is not the purity of ig- 
norance. Impurity is often the result of igno- 
rance. 

Few parents begin to reahze what the curi- 
osity of a child means, and what it will lead to 
in this matter if not satisfied in a wholesome 
and normal manner by proper instruction. 
The minds of children, as every one knows, are 
filled with interrogation points on all subjects. 
How do you think they can be reared in a home 
without knowing something of the relation of 
the opposite sexes? The mapner of living of 
their father and mother, the babies coming into 
the home, and other facts of life cannot be hid- 
den from them. Children are not blind, and 
they are naturally more inquisitive about those 
things which are purposely kept from them. 

Boys and girls know that when they arrive 
at a certain age they are kept apart for some 
reason, that there is a radical difference be- 
tween the sexes. They cannot understand the 
reason for all this silence and mystery; for, 
while everything else is talked about, a veil is 
drawn over all sex matters. They wonder 
why you stammer and blush whenever the sub- 
ject is broached, or try to put them off with all 



The Crime of Silence 43 

sorts of indirectness and fables, or pass it over 
in jest. 

If the life you are leading is legitimate and 
right, if the generation and perpetuation of 
life are legitimate and sacred things, why do 
you seem ashamed of them? By your silence 
you appear to indicate that even the best peo- 
ple in the world are living in a manner which is 
not right, and that the Creator has decreed that 
some functions of the body, though necessary, 
are not as sacred as others. 

The whole training of our children is cal- 
culated to give them a totally wrong impres- 
sion of the sex relation. The criminal silence 
of parents, together with the unholy, vulgar 
insinuations and suggestions which they absorb 
on the street, in the schools, and in all sorts of 
places outside the home tend to impress upon 
children the idea that there is something not 
only marvelously mysterious about it, but also 
something unclean and wicked. Then they go 
to church and hear the exposition of the doc- 
trine that "we are all conceived in sin;" and, 
putting this fact with the mysterious silence 
of fathers and mothers, they conclude that 
there is something even in the relation of their 



44 The Crime of Silence 

parents which must not be alluded to. Then, 
as the boy especially grows toward youth and 
manhood, he sees and hears about the awful 
degradation of the underworld, the sowing of 
wild oats, and other impure things, all of which 
information only mystifies him more and more, 
and further stimulates a morbid curiosity in 
regard to all other sex matters. 

Indeed, one of the worst things about this 
criminal silence upon the sex question is that 
it often makes the sex impulse itself the youth's 
teacher, by arousing an insistent desire for 
light regarding this wonderful mystery; and 
he resorts to all sorts of questionable sources, 
impure associates, books and pictures which 
appeal to the vile and vicious in human nature 
to get the information he craves. He is thus 
led to listen to low, vulgar insinuations and in- 
nuendoes, which would simply disgust him if he 
had had clean, scientific knowledge on the sub- 
ject. Not being safeguarded in a sane, whole- 
some way, his inflamed imagination runs away 
with him, and before he realizes it he is plunged 
into the very vice which would instinctively 
have repelled him had he been properly posted. 

Had all children had clean, pure instruction 



The Crime of Silence 45 

upon this wonderful and sacred subject from 
the start, this morbid, vulgar side of it which 
permeates the very atmosphere of all vile 
places would never have developed. 

Many a youth, when he begins to study 
medicine, has a lot of morbid sex curiosity; 
but, when he goes into the dissecting room and 
becomes familiar with the great truths of anat- 
omy and physiology, when he realizes the mar- 
velousness of the human machine, with all 
its complex functions, the facts of life become 
sacred to him. Morbid curiosity vanishes be- 
fore the light of science. Distorted informa- 
tion has no more attractions for him, because 
he has seen into the very holy of holies of 
human life. 

Is it not time that we treat it in a scientific 
way, that we turn on the light on this whole 
question? Is it not time that we put a stop to 
the discrediting of marriage, the most sacred 
of all human relations, and give our children 
pure information in place of the impure ; scien- 
tific facts in the place of distorted knowledge, 
knowledge which tends to arouse morbid curi- 
osity? The whole subject has been kept too 
long in the dark. Evil thrives in darkness, in 



46 The Crime of Silence 

ignorance. Light and knowledge are their 
antidotes. They will clean up the foulest of 
human cesspools. 

It may be hard for you to overcome tradi- 
tional custom and tell your boys and girls the 
truth about their own bodies, but ignorance of 
the subject may prove fatal. Their future de- 
pends upon their being properly instructed on 
these tabooed questions during the dangerous 
years when special temptations will come to 
them, and when they will need all the protec- 
tion which the wisdom of your riper years and 
wider knowledge of human nature enables you 
to give them. Let them profit by your mis- 
takes and any unfortunate experiences that 
may have come to you from ignorance in youth. 

The question whether instruction in sex hy- 
giene should be given in public schools is a 
burning one just now. We find teachers, col- 
lege professors and clergymen ranged in op- 
posite camps. 

Professor Hugo Munsterberg, of Harvard 
University, says: "The cleanest boys and 
girls cannot give theoretical attention to their 
thoughts concerning sexuality without the 
whole mechanism for re-inforcement automati- 



The Crime of Silence 47 

cally entering into action. We may instruct 
with the best intention to suppress, and yet our 
instruction itself must become a source of 
stimulation, which unnecessarily creates the 
desire for improper conduct/* 

Mrs. Ella Flagg Young, superintendent of 
the pubhc schools of Chicago, on the other 
hand, says that their experiment in sex instruc- 
tion in the schools of Chicago has increased 
the girls' sense of their own dignity and the 
marvelous meaning of their nature. The 
knowledge they are acquiring is taking the 
place of the silly ignorance which so long has 
been regarded as innocence, and the girls hold 
their heads higher and seem to think more of 
themselves. They have greater respect for 
their own bodies. 

Only a short time ago the teaching of sex 
hygiene in Sunday Schools was approved in 
the report to the convention of the Interna- 
tional Sunday School Association by E. K. 
Mohr, Superintendent of the Purity Depart- 
ment. 

''Sex knowledge will be taught," said Mr. 
Mohr. ''If not in the homes and the Sunday 
School, it will be taught in the street. Silence 



48 The Crime of Silence 

is criminal. We cannot remain inactive. We 
must teach these facts and teach them right, 
so that knowledge may lead to purity and 
righteousness. 

"With the new awakening and discussion of 
sex matters, the pendulum has swung from si- 
lence to publicity that is almost nauseating. 
Literature, the stage, the newspapers, the 
'movies' have exploited the interest in the sub- 
ject. The endeavor to avoid false modesty 
may in the end break down the barriers of real 
modesty. 

"With the religious atmosphere and rever- 
ent receptive attitude of the Sunday School, 
it is eminently fitted to bear the message of 
the knowledge that tends to personal purity. 
It is the plainest religious strategy." 

I once knew a man of liberal education 
who, from being an honored member of a col- 
lege faculty, had been dragged slowly down 
by the practice of self -abuse until he had no 
decided opinions on any subject of importance. 
He dropped, too, in the grade and character 
of the work he could and would do until he 
became and continued for a few years the 
caretaker of the lavatories in a large hotel. 



The Crime of Silence 49 

Professor Henry, the bell boys called him, half 
in derision, half in respect for his evident in- 
herent ability. Death finally closed his career 
in almost total mental vacuity. He had ac- 
quired the ^ habit unwarned, as a boy ; and, 
though it had been of slow growth for a few 
years, during which he climbed upward in life, 
it finally conquered and destroyed him. 

It is a strange fact that many of the most 
highly educated and cultivated people are still 
reluctant to sanction even the discussion of sex 
life, except in medical circles. Teachers are 
seriously handicapped by parents' reticence; 
and, even while teachers feel that they could 
materially help the children, they hesitate to in- 
troduce the subject; whereas, if they knew that 
they were backed by the parents, they could 
do a great deal. I believe, however, that the 
time will come when sex instruction will be 
given in our schools, in connection with biology, 
hygiene, and ethics, and the evolution of the 
whole subject will be as natural and normal 
as that of any other study. I believe that no 
student should be allowed to graduate from 
college, or any other of our higher institutions 
of learning without passing a satisfactory ex- 



50 The Crime of Silence 

amination upon the nature and meaning of the 
sexual instincts, so that the young man may be 
fitted to fulfill the holy office of husband and 
father, and the young woman the sacred office 
of wife and mother. 

Some of the women's clubs in America are 
doing excellent work in providing courses for 
mothers and teachers ; and, apart from the sen- 
sational exploitations of vice, there is an ever- 
increasing movement for the dissemination of 
wholesome knowledge on this most important 
of all matters touching the welfare of the race. 

This movement is not confined to any par- 
ticular locality or nationality. It is sweeping 
with irresistible force over the entire civilized 
world. It promises to tear off from society 
its mask of prudery and false modesty and to 
start youths and maidens out in life with a 
pure, clean, scientific knowledge of their own 
bodies which will safeguard their health, their 
homes and future families. I believe that this 
universal campaign of sex hygiene is destined 
to bring more good to the human race than any 
other movement of modern times. 



CHAPTER III 

"dangerous passing" 

We paint, ourselves, the joy, the fear 

Of which the coming life is made, 
And fill our future's atmosphere 

With sunshine or with shade; 
The tissue of the life to be. 

We weave with colors all our own ; 
And, in the field of destiny, 

We reap as we have sown. — J. G. Whittier. 

So close does falsehood approach to truth that the wise man 
would do well not to trust himself on the narrow edge. 

— Cicero. 

A POLICE inspector, in an address before 
New York public school graduates, said: 
''I have just come from the Tombs, where 
I closed the gates behind a wealthy mur- 
derer. I want to tell you, young men, that 
ninety-nine per cent, of the crimes committed 
to-day are caused by evil companions." 

Familiarity with vulgarity tends to make us 
vulgar. Familiarity with evil, with immoral- 
ity, robs it of its hideousness. What we have 

51 



52 The Crime or Silence 

become accustomed to, we first give our con- 
sent to, then our approval. Those who asso- 
ciate with vile characters tend to become vile. 

Investigation has shown that a very large 
percentage of those who have strayed from the 
path of virtue began their downfall through 
the fatal contagion of impurity communicated 
from vicious associates. 

One who has made a special study of the ef- 
fect of immorality upon men says that impure 
thought suggested by evil associates is one of 
the earliest indications of the downfall of char- 
acter. He affirms that ninety-five per cent, of 
the men and boys in factories and places of 
manual labor boast of their impurity. 

This seems an appalling statement, but it is 
supplemented by that of another investigator 
who says, "Seventy-five to eighty per cent, of 
men have, before marriage, been infected with 
some form of venereal disease." He adds that 
the truth of this "is widely accepted by medical 
authorities." 

Under such conditions as these it is not diffi- 
cult to imagine the danger of youth from im- 
pure associations-. Even clean, innocent, beau- 
tifully reared children, who seem so pure that 



"Dangerous Passing^' 53 

nothing can contaminate them, are touched by 
the leper spot of vicious contagion when thrown 
into bad company, as the soundest and rosiest 
apples are soon infected when in contact with 
other apples which have begun to decay. 

Impure suggestion is a youth's worst enemy. 
After an impure thought has once taken hold 
of the mind it requires strong will power to 
control one's desires. The trouble begins with 
the thought; hence the imperative importance 
of keeping with pure people, keeping in a pure, 
wholesome atmosphere, reading 'clean litera- 
ture, because evil associations awaken forbid- 
den inclinations. The suggestions of bad 
companions visualize the strongest temptations, 
and greatly increase the dangers that surround 
youth and innocence. 

A boy who chooses for companions those 
who are already corrupted, who sneer at virtue, 
whose ideals are low flying, who actually boast 
of their impurity, can not escape the pollution 
that invariably results from such associations. 
"Evil communications corrupt good manners," 
says a well-known proverb. Even more do 
they corrupt good morals. On the other hand, 
just as surely does the boy who selects his 



54 The Crime of Silence 

friends among those who are clean, whole- 
some, pure-minded, who aims to be somebody 
and to do something in the world, who has no 
secret companions to whom he would not in- 
troduce his sister or his mother, — just as surely 
does such a boy incline toward all that is noble, 
pure, and uplifting. 

There is as strong an affinity between evil 
things as between good things. All forms of 
dissipation belong to the same family, and 
there is a strong probability, amounting almost 
to certainty, that the boy who is introduced to 
a single vicious practice by evil companions 
will be initiated into the whole family of evil 
things. 

Judges in children's courts tell us that 
nearly every boy who goes wrong begins with 
smoking cigarettes. While we know that thou- 
sands of men who smoke are pure and clean in 
their lives, yet it is a fact that learning to smoke 
is usually a boy's initiation into wrongdoing. 
Smoking has a much more demoralizing influ- 
ence upon a boy, because of his immaturity, 
than upon a man. This is especially true if 
he learns to smoke during the dangerous years 
of puberty, when he already has all the natural 



"Dangerous Passing" 55 

temptations which he is able to withstand. Al- 
though it is not as vicious in its influence as in- 
toxicating drinks, yet somehow nicotine, espe- 
cially in youth, is very often the entering wedge 
which opens the door to alcohol, other deadly 
drugs, and sexual sins. All bad things seem 
to be hnked together. All forms of dissipa- 
tion, vice, and crime go hand in hand. Their 
affinify draws them together. This is what 
makes it so difficult to reform a person when 
he is started downhill, just as the affinity of all 
that is good and pure and clean tends to draw 
a man up when he is going in that direction, 
when he is trained with the family of good in- 
fluences. 

Somebody has said that the common expres- 
sion ''They all do it" is the devil's other name. 
Innumerable life tragedies have resulted from 
the suggestion of ''they all do it." Young 
people have a morbid dread of refusing to dp 
the things their companions do, even when they 
know they are wrong. Trying to be a good 
fellow, to do as "the other fellows" did has 
proved the gateway to ruin for many a boy. 
How many youths are ashamed to refuse to 
smoke a cigarette, or a cigar, or to "take a 



56 The Crime of Silence 

drink," because their companions think it is 
manly to smoke and drink. 

It is true that it often takes a great deal of 
courage for a youth to refuse to yield to temp- 
tation, to rebuke impurity or vulgarity, or to 
show his disgust and disapprobation of an im- 
pure suggestion or a questionable story. He 
fears the ridicule of his companions. But the 
moral bravery that frowns on such things is 
the strongest proof of real manliness, and wins 
the admiration even of those who laugh and 
jeer at it. 

I remember a young man who had been ap- 
pointed to an important position and who was 
given a ''send-off" by his young friends. At 
the dinner in his honor questionable stories and 
suggestions were repeated. Toasts had been 
drunk to girls with whom some of the young 
men had improper relations, when the guest of 
the evening was asked to speak. He raised 
his glass and said: ''I diink a toast to my 
mother!" This pointed re^^uke put an end to 
all the questionable proceedings. 

As some perverted tastes develop a prefer- 
ence for tainted meats, so many men seem to 
prefer a tainted story, a tainted book, a tainted 



''Dangerous Passing" 57 

picture, a vulgar joke, or a low, foul insinua- 
tion. Their diseased imaginations revel in 
filth, until they lose their taste entirely for the 
sweet, the pure, the beautiful, the normal. 

When boys lose their love and appreciation 
for clean humor and laugh at impure stories 
and coarse vulgar suggestions and jokes, it is a 
pretty sure indication that they are in danger, 
that they have been sexually contaminated, 
and have formed vicious associations or habits. 
People who tell immoral stories and revel in 
vulgar innuendoes are on the downward track. 

''A great trait of Grant's character," said 
George W. Childs, 'Vas his purity. I never 
heard him express an impure thought, or make 
an indelicate allusion. There is nothing I ever 
heard him say that could not be repeated in 
the presence of women. When President, if 
a man was brought up for an appointment, and 
it was shown that he was an immoral man, 
Grant would not appoint him, no matter how 
great the pressure brought to bear." Many 
instances characteristic of the great general's 
answer to impure stories are on record. On 
one occasion, when he formed one of a dinner- 
party of American gentlemen in a foreign city, 



58 The Crime oe Silence 

conversation drifted to questionable matters, 
when he suddenly rose and said, "Gentlemen, 
please excuse me; I will retire." 

''I have such a rich story that I want to tell 
you," said an officer who, one evening during 
the Civil War, came into the Union camp in a 
rollicking mood. ''There are no ladies pres- 
ent, are there?" General Grant, lifting his 
eyes, from the paper which he was reading, and 
looking the officer squarely in the eye, said, 
slowly and deliberately: ''No, hut there are 
gentlemen present'' 

A manly man is Nature's gentleman, the 
only true gentleman, and he will no more pol- 
lute his lips by repeating an impure story or 
joke than will Nature's gentlewoman, a wom- 
anly woman. Neither will associate with, or 
make companions of those who take pleasure 
in such things, who delight in what is gross, 
low, immoral. 

You can not touch pitch without being de- 
filed. You can not associate with the impure 
without catching the taint of their impurity, 
their sensualism, their lust, poisons which act 
like a leaven in the whole nature. The mind, 
responding to the law of suggestion, soon 



"Dangerous Passing" 59 

adopts what it is familiar with ; and, before you 
reahze it, you fall into the vicious practices of 
your companions. This is one of the dangers 
of college life, of being led into false paths by 
youths who are morally tainted, but who have 
brilliant or magnetic qualities that draw others 
to them, or by the large class of wealthy stu- 
dents, rotten at the core, who have made some 
of our institutions of learning hotbeds of dissi- 
pation. 

In order to be safe from moral contagion, 
one must as far as possible keep away from 
temptation, away from people, from books, 
from pictures, from places, from anything 
which can possibly suggest a particle of impur- 
ity. Then the battle for self-control, for the 
mastery of unruly passions, will be an easy one. 
There is nothing to be gained by putting your- 
Iself in a position where you will be constantly 
[straining your self-control, straining your will 
[power, which may be weak, where you will be 
[continually fighting against vicious sugges- 
tions. A youth who keeps his mind absolutely 
pure has the whip hand over his passions. It 
is the impure thought that irritates, that gen- 
erates the secretions which produce the passion. 



60 The Crime or Silence 

As long as the thought is pure the body will 
take care of itself. 

Every impure thought or experience affects 
the whole body through the mind. A sensual 
thought makes a sensual, beastly body. A 
person who practices impurity doesn't realize 
that he is brutalizing his body, sensualizing his 
mind, vulgarizing his own nature; that, after 
a time, everybody who comes in contact with 
him feels his animalism. No one can success- 
fully cover up the taint of continued impurity. 
Nor can he resist its mental ravages. While 
the mental faculties become weaker and 
weaker, the passions become stronger and more 
inflamed and goad the weak will on to excesses 
which result in terrible demoralization, degen- 
eration of both the physical and the moral be- 
ing. 

We are so constructed that everything that 
is worth while, everything that we prize most, 
everything that elevates, costs us something. 
We must pay for it in effort, and it is precious 
in proportion to the struggles and the sacrifices 
which we make to obtain it. A youth who 
would keep himself ''unspotted from the 
world," especially a city youth, must be con- 



"Dangerous Passing" 61 

stantly on his guard against the snares and 
temptations which surround him. 

''Look out! Paint!" wrote the keeper of a 
beer garden on a large card which he tacked up 
at the entrance to his premises. But he was 
a poor penman, his rude "P" looked for all the 
world like a "T," and those who saw it read, 
"Look out! Taint!" Yet it was a most ap- 
propriate notice, for the danger from taint 
within was far greater than from paint with- 
out. Look out, young man; beware, young 
woman, before you enter such places. Only 
too often, whole lives are tainted therein as 
badly as one rotting vegetable taints others 
around it. 

In the alleys, the byways, the closed streets 
of our cities w^e often see the sign,, ''Dangerous 
Passing." Although not in written characters, 
we can see this sign all along the pathway of 
life. We read it over the street and avenue 
that leads to vice and degradation; we read it 
over doors that lead to saloons and gambling 
hells, and dens of infamy. We read it in front 
of all the pleasures which are forbidden or 
doubtful. 

"Dangerous Passing." We read it in the 



62 The Crime or Silence 

deformed and crippled lives of those who have 
disregarded its warning, in the botched, de- 
moralized and bungling work of the weak and 
inefficient. We read it in the ruined lives and 
lost opportunities and blighted hopes of those 
who would not heed it. We see it in all those 
who lead irregular or dissipated lives, who ex- 
haust their vitality in youth. We read it in 
nervous wrecks, in brain trouble, insanity. 
We read it in the hesitating step, in the wrin- 
kles of the prematurely old, in those who carry 
about in their bodies unmistakable signs which 
are the results of not heeding the warning, 
"Dangerous Passing." 

Be careful how you disregard the danger 
sign which Nature puts up, her warning of the 
''dangerous passing" place where justice, for- 
giveness, mercy and even love are left behind. 



CHAPTER IV 

"a little deyil to play with" 

'Tis life, not death for which we pant: 
'Tis life, whereof our nerves are scant; 
More life and fuller that we want. 

— Alfred Tenkysok. 

"Mother^ if I'm not naughty; if I am really 
a very good boy, will God let me have just one 
little devil to play with when I go to Heaven?" 

This question was put to his mother by a 
little fellow of five. To a student of child life 
it is more pathetic than funny, signifying, as it 
does, that the idea of real happiness, joy, and 
freedom from restraint was associated in the 
mind of this child with evil. 

It is possible to so train children that vice 
will seem attractive and virtue undesirable. In 
multitudes of homes they are brought up on 
goody-goody philosophy, to the entire exclu- 
sion of all the natural instincts of childhood. 
Not only does this sort of training not appeal 
to the children, but it prejudices them against 

63 



64 The Crime of Silence 

the very things which the philosophy is sup- 
posed to inculcate. 

Nor is this inclination toward evil, as sparks 
fly upward, confined only to the young. 
There is a strange element of perversity in all 
human nature which often impels us to do the 
very things we know in our heart of hearts may 
be bad for us, — ^may be even fatal for us. This 
it is which impels and seems almost irresistibly 
to force some people standing on the brink 
of a precipice to throw themselves over. Said 
a highly educated, moral, mature lady once at 
the French court, as she held to the light a 
glass of pure, sparkling water, ''Oh, if it were 
only wicked to drink this, how nice it would 
be!" 

It is idle to say, however true, that people 
should themselves conquer all such inclinations 
and ideas. It is also incumbent upon us, who 
are supposedly superior to all such weaknesses, 
to help keep them away from the brink of such 
a precipice. 

You cannot bring children up on the husks 
of righteousness, and the very essence of the 
religion of childhood, of all religion, is joy, 
gladness, cheerfulness, bubbling, optimistic 



"A Little Devil to Play With" 65 

life. Theology doesn't appeal to children, but 
life does ; Nature does ; all the beautiful things 
the Creator has given us for use and enjoy- 
ment fill the heart of a child with gladness. 

"I am so full of happiness/' said one in a 
spontaneous outburst of joy, ''that I could not 
be any happier unless I could grow." 

As a rule the happiest children make not only 
the happiest, but also the most useful men and 
women. We cannot give children too much 
real fun, too much heart sunshine, too much 
love. They thrive on such things. They are 
their normal food, and the home is the place 
above all others where they should get an 
abundance of them. 

Yet in many families the children are hungry 
for affection, as well as for amusement; but 
they get no encouragement; their play-loving 
instincts are constantly suppressed. They get 
no pleasure at home, no love from their par- 
ents, and they naturally seek these things else- 
where. I have known boys to go to the bad 
because their policeman parents put them un- 
der too strict surveillance. While unwilling 
to let them play and have a good time at home, 
they were so afraid they would get with bad 



66 The Crime of Silence 

boys and hear something that would contami- 
nate them that they kept them shut up in the 
house, or in their own yards, until the young- 
sters rebelled and took advantage of every op- 
portunity to get away and find ''just one little 
devil to play with.'' And because they were 
denied the chance for self-expression that every 
normal child demands and requires, they found 
not one, indeed, but many little devils to play 
with! 

There is a certain mysterious, subtle fascina- 
tion in wrongdoing which cannot be explained, 
but it is something that especially appeals to 
children and young people who have been sup- 
pressed, over-guarded, over-watched by par- 
ents or guardians. Their curiosity is strength- 
ened by repression, and they are constantly 
wanting to see what the forbidden things are 
like. 

If children are allowed to give vent to all 
that is joyous and happy and spontaneous in 
their natures; if they are not continually re- 
pressed by '^don'ts" in regard to legitimate 
things, the things they ought to have, they will 
be much less likely to be attracted to those that 
are forbidden, and they will be infinitely more 



"A Little Devil to Play With'' 67 

likely to blossom out into helpful men and 
women, instead of becoming suppressed and 
sad-faced, if not depraved, individuals. Chil- 
dren who are encouraged in self-expression 
through their play instinct will not only make 
much more normal human beings but will also 
make better business men, better professional 
men, better citizens, better men and women 
generally. They will succeed better and have 
a nobler influence in the world. Joy and fun 
are great developers, calling out our richest re- 
sources, educating our finest powers. 

It is self-expression that develops power 
along moral as well as mental and physical 
lines. If one is constantly repressed, his facul- 
ties will be stifled and his moral nature will 
also suffer. Repression causes arrested devel- 
opment in more children than almost anything 
else. There must be freedom, a sense of lib- 
erty for self-expression, otherwise the mind 
will not give up its best, the body will be 
stunted, and the whole being will be impover- 
ished. 

A poor boy who had been taken from the 
slums to a boys' farm home, and who had been 
told all his Hfe that he was good-for-nothing, 



68 The Crime of Silence 

said to the other boys : ''I dunno nothin' and 
I alius did. My parents alius tole me I wuz 
nobody and never would be." 

Physicians tell us that the sexual plagues 
which curse so many youths are often due to 
lack of proper physical exercise and play. 
Boys like this little lad who have no boyhood, 
who are brought up to work, who have very 
little or no play in their lives, who do not have 
an outlet for their fun-loving propensities, are 
very much more apt to fall into vicious sexual 
habits than those who have plenty of whole- 
some exercise and fun. 

There is nothing else so helpful to the nor- 
mal development of the sexual life as a lot of 
play and fun and plenty of physical exercise 
of a vigorous sort, such as boxing, wrestling, 
football, baseball, rowing, running, etc. All 
these things are splendid for boys and give 
them a wholesome outlet for their energies, 
which is extremely important, especially be- 
tween the ages of twelve and twenty. 

Boys who have a great deal of healthful, 
wholesome exercise out of doors with good as- 
sociates, boys who retire so healthily tired that 
they fall asleep almost as soon as their heads 



''A Little Deyil to Play With'' 69 

touch their pillows, and who are encouraged to 
rise immediately when they first awake are 
not likely to become victims of vicious habits. 

When a youth has complete self-expression, 
when he has all the play and fun which his na- 
ture demands: when he runs and plays to his 
heart's content in the open air, there is little 
danger of pent-up longings and desires finding 
outlet in forbidden ways. But the moment 
he is suppressed, forbidden normal exercise 
out-of-doors and housed too closely, his abnor- 
mal appetites come into ascendency, and, not 
having been trained in self-mastery, he often 
becomes the prey of evil suggestions and temp- 
tations. 

Pent-up desires and passions, like volcanoes, 
when they are stifled, will break out somewhere. 

One reason why many youths go wrong is 
because they are not given sufficient outlet for 
their pent-up energies, their activities are 
limited. They have no proper childhood. 
They do not have enough fun, enough ro- 
mance ; their homes are too serious. 

Mothers are often terribly shocked by the 
development of what they regard as the sudden 
depravity of their daughters, who run away 



70 The Crime of Silence 

with men, or are otherwise led astray. They 
seem to think that the sudden lapse is quite 
unaccountable, but we notice that these things 
happen oftenest in straightlaced homes, where 
the girls have been over-chaperoned, over-pro- 
tected, suppressed, repressed, and hedged in at 
every point. Such a life is not normal for 
healthy, active girls. Their boundless ener^ 
gies must have an outlet; and, if they are not 
allowed a natural one, they will force one in 
some unforeseen, unfortunate direction. If 
these girls had been given more freedom, if 
they had been thrown more upon their own re- 
sponsibility, their good behavior, they would 
have developed more character, more will 
power, more common sense and moral fiber. 
It is a great injustice to a girl to bring her up 
in a glass case, shielded from every rough wind, 
not allowed any freedom of expression, to 
bring her up in such a way that she is likely to 
become an easy prey to evil masculine influ-' 
ences. 

A girl should be so reared and trained as to 
be always strong and vigorous, self-reliant, 
able to judge for herself, and to be independent 
at all stages of her growth. The soft, flabby, 



''A Little Devil to Play With'' 71 

characterless girl who has been over-protected 
and over-watched, when she attains her ma- 
jority and a certain measure of liberty, is likely 
to do all sorts of hazardous things which may 
be fatal. 

There is a happy medium in this matter of 
training children, as in everything else, which 
produces the best results. To give children 
too much liberty and freedom of action is as 
pernicious as to give them too little. The out- 
come is usually productive of as much evil in 
the one case as in the other. 

It is imperative, however, that those who 
have the care and training of children should 
remember that there is a terrific force in youth 
which, if not directed into. useful, helpful chan- 
nels, becomes a menace. Many parents do 
not fully appreciate this tremendous pent-up 
energy in their children, nor realize that, un- 
less there is a legitimate channel for its expres- 
sion, it will find an illegitimate one. 

Some over-strict fathers and mothers who 
manage to keep depraving influences away 
from their children by perpetually watching 
and chaperoning them make the mistake of 
starving their imaginations by suppressing 



72 The Crime or Silence 

their love of romance instead of guiding it into 
healthy channels. 

There is a great deal of romance and love 
of adventure in all normal children, and, if this 
is suppressed, strangled, there is a correspond- 
ing deficiency in the nature. Any function 
which is not used atrophies, dries up, and we 
are so much the less natural. 

Few parents realize what a powerful part 
romance plays in young lives. It is as natural 
for children to play, to dream, to romance, as 
it is for them to breathe. This is their normal 
expression. 

It is astonishing how many youths, and even 
children among the poor, consult fortune 
tellers and palmists, many of whom are con- 
nected with disreputable houses. They pre- 
dict riches, handsome husbands, and a luxuri- 
ous life for pretty girls, and they often play 
into the hands of pals, who gradually ensnare 
the girls into evil ways. 

A leader in settlement work tells of a hard- 
working girl who was told by a palmist that 
diamonds and all sorts of luxuries were coming 
to her soon. After this she accepted a dia- 



"A Little Devil to Play With" 73 

mond ring from a man whose improper atten- 
tions she had previously withstood. 

In this way many ill-trained young girls, 
while searching for adventure and trying to 
satisfy their longing for romance, are led into a 
vicious life. 

Regular habits, plenty of sleep, — outdoor 
sleeping rooms are the most healthful — fresh 
air, a happy home life, — home made so 
pleasant, harmonious and beautiful that chil- 
dren prefer it to any other place on earth — 
all these are tremendous influences in molding 
a pure, noble life. And such influences are 
very necessary to-day, for, at best our whole 
American life is dangerously stimulating and 
over-exciting for young people. 

Owing to the fact that in the past boys were 
brought up with the idea that, while impurity 
in a girl was the unforgivable sin, for them it 
brought no punishment — was, indeed, by those 
who should guide them upward, considered 
necessary for their health — they now require 
especial care, even more than girls, during the 
dangerous years of adolescence. 

For this reason changes in a growing boy 



74 The Crime of Silence 

should be watched very carefully. A youth 
who becomes shy and morose at this time, who 
secludes himself from the rest of the family, 
who always wants to be alone, and especially 
the one who has an unnatural appetite, is just 
the one to be watched and cautioned by par- 
ents or guardians. 

The abuse of the sexual function has a 
peculiarly demoralizing, deteriorating influence 
upon the nervous system, upon the mental as 
well as the moral faculties. There is some- 
thing so especially degrading in the perversion 
of the sexual instinct and functions that it 
coarsens the whole nature. 

We are often shocked at the gradual change 
in the disposition and appearance of growing 
boys, whose entire being becomes coarse, re- 
pellent. Ignorant parents try to explain these 
radical changes in disposition and appearance, 
the gradual coarsening of their boys, by their 
rapid growth and development, when it is often 
in reality due to the perversion of the sexual 
functions, for it is certain that something fine 
and delicate and beautiful goes out of the life 
after any contamination of this nature. 

Great care should be taken during tliis dan- 



''A Little Devil to Play With" 75 

gerous period to give the boy the right kind of 
food. Meats, condiments, rich sauces, all 
things which would arouse passion, especially 
at night, should be forbidden. All food should 
be avoided which tends to disturb the sleep, 
and the boy should be taught to jump out of 
bed in the morning the moment he wakes. 

If all children were to eat their principal 
meal in the middle of the day, and to have a 
light supper, something like corn bread and 
milk, they w^ould have sweet, refreshing sleep, 
free from the restlessness and irritation caused 
by rich foods, especially meats, with piquant 
sauces, condiments, etc. Rich, complex diets 
are not for youth, and parents little realize 
what risks they run in giving their children 
such food. 

I know families where the children are not 
only allowed to eat heavy meats, gravies 
and all sorts of condiments for dinner, but they 
are also allowed to eat late at night, just be- 
fore going to bed. These children are not only 
abnormally nervous and irritable, but their skin 
is covered with blotches. Then they are al- 
lowed to go to all sorts of places, theatres, 
dances, and other amusements late in the eve- 



76 The Crime of Silence 

ning, and, as a rule, do not get to bed until 
after they should have had at least two or three 
hours' sound sleep. In short, their whole 
training is calculated to overdevelop the sexual 
instinct, to hasten instead of to retard the 
period of puberty. 

The ignoring of the whole subject of sex 
by parents, their carelessness or ignorance in 
regard to the question of food, exercise, amuse- 
ments, etc., for their children, especially dur- 
ing the years approaching puberty, has 
wrought much suffering and sorrow in the lives 
of millions of boys and girls. 

Every healthy youth has a real ambition to 
win out in life, to make good, to stand for 
something. He may not realize just how he is 
going to do this, but he has a sort of general 
understanding with himself that he is going to 
be somebody, and if he fails to achieve his am- 
bition there is something wrong in his training, 
something vicious in his environment. 

Normal boys do not deliberately plan to 
form habits or to do things which are going to 
seriously cripple or absolutely defeat their abil- 
ity to make good in the world. They form 
such habits and do such things ignorantly. 



"A Little Deyil to Play With'' 77 

If you parents would help your boys to take 
account of their success and welfare assets, if 
you would explain to them that their capital 
lies in their health, and this in turn in their 
food, their exercise, their recreation, care of 
their body; if you would point out to them that 
their possibilities for making good in life con- 
sist in their courage, their ambition, their aspi- 
ration, their ideal, their determination, their 
persistent industry, their grit, their initiative, 
their self-reliance, and that all of these can 
be tremendously strengthened or impaired in 
the degree that they care for or neglect their 
health, you would find that no normal youth 
would deliberately throw away his precious life 
capital by succumbing to vicious habits. No 
well reared, properly instructed boy would in- 
sist upon wasting his vitahty, squandering his 
precious life force in any form of debauchery. 

As civilization advances, the struggle for life 
becomes more and more intense. As our ma- 
terial standards of living grow higher and 
higher, as comforts and luxuries increase, so 
do the perils and temptations that assail the 
higher spiritual hfe multiply. You do not 
know what dangers may beset your children 



78 The Crime oe Silence 

when they leave the home nest to make their 
own way in the world. 

As a matter of fact, one of the most danger- 
ous periods in the hves of boys and girls is that 
between leaving school and getting employ- 
ment; because, instead of having, as they 
should, when they leave school, a pretty good 
idea of what they are best fitted for, they 
blunder around, often for many months, per- 
haps years, before finding the place which is at 
all suited to them. 

If the State afforded the children in all our 
schools proper vocational training, as it will 
some day, this interval would be greatly less- 
ened. In the meantime, thousands of youths 
are led astray while waiting for work after 
leaving school. Having no special training, 
nor any idea what vocation they are best fitted 
to enter, they often experiment a long time be- 
fore they get permanently located, and in this 
interval are frequently drawn into all sorts of 
vicious experiences, which lead to their ruin. 

Questionable employments are also a moral 
menace to growing boys and girls. Only a 
few years ago the country was stirred up over 
the terrible revelations of the demoralizing in- 



"A Little Deyil to Play With" 79 

fluences to which messenger boys who are 
obhged to go on errands to disreputable houses 
at night are subjected. A great many fine 
youths are thus led into vice through familiarity 
with evil. Many business men who lead 
double lives employ them to carry their 
secret messages, flowers, and presents, to such 
places. Sometimes they are sent to the better 
parts of the city, apparently to reputable 
houses; but often they are called to the vilest 
resorts, and sent for liquors and drugs. 

Although the telegraph companies have done 
a great deal to stop this evil, yet only a few 
states, for example, New York and Wisconsin, 
have raised the legal age of night messengers 
to twenty-one years. 

I have known many cases where splendid 
boys who went into the messenger service dur- 
ing the Christmas holidays, or on special occca- 
sions, have been led into vicious practices by 
becoming familiar with evil when on errands 
which have taken them into disreputable places. 
They have been there brought in contact with 
a side of life of which they had known nothing 
previously, and, not having been safeguarded, 
forewarned, by their parents, who have always 



80 The Crime of Silence 

remained silent upon the sex question, they 
have become easy victims of vice and ignorance. 
If these boys had been properly trained, had 
been posted in these matters, and warned of 
the terrible possible results from sexual abuse 
or sin, they might have been spared their tragic 
experiences. 

A noted settlement worker tells how many 
youths of good moral impulses have been led 
into vicious lives through the influence of liberal 
tips which they have received from inmates of 
disreputable houses. She says that they are 
often given fees of a dollar or more when they 
are sent to buy cocaine, morphine, or some 
other drug, or ice cream, cake, or sweetmeats. 
More than one messenger boy, through his 
familiarity with evil, has fallen so low as to 
become a white slave trader. 

The majority of youths who become sexually 
tainted and wrecked get into the mire through 
sheer ignorance. They do not know what it 
means, just as most of the girls who go wrong 
do so because of their utter ignorance of it all. 
People do not voluntarily go into things which 
they know spell ruin. They simply do not 
know. They have not been properly trained. 



CHAPTER V 

WHITE SLAYERY AND THE CHILD WOMAN 

We are very slightly changed 
From the semi-apes who ranged 

India's prehistoric clay; 
Whoso drew the longest bow 
Ran his brother down, you know, 

As we run men down to-day. 

— RuDYARD Kipling. 

Kipling's famous stanza, given above, 
would be still more appropriate and forcible 
had he substituted for ''men" in the last line 
the word women, meaning the women — the 
child- women especially — who are driven or be- 
guiled into ' 'white slavery." 

"Suffer little children to come unto me, and 
forbid them not; for of such is the kingdom of 
God," said the Founder of Christianity two 
thousand years ago. In Chicago, New York, 
London, Paris, Berlin, and all the other great 
centres of the Christian world, we answer His 
invitation by suffering them to be swept into 
the brothels ! 

81 



82 The Crime or Silence 

Of one hundred and thirty girls who had 
gone wrong in a certain district in Chicago, 
recent investigation revealed the fact that the 
majority of them had become victims of vice 
at the average age of eight ! 

Many of the children brought into the juve- 
nile courts, and rescued by protective societies 
do not seem to realize what they are doing or 
what it must all lead to. On one occasion, 
when Jane Addams was asked to go to a rescue 
home and address the inmates, she tells how, 
when she got there, she found on the little white 
bed of every child or on the stiff white chair 
beside it, the dolls of the. delinquent owners, 
still young enough to love those supreme toys 
of childhood! Her lecture, she said, did not 
fit the occasion, so she remained to dress dolls 
for a company of little girls, who eagerly asked 
her all about the dolls she possessed in her 
childhood ! 

In ''A New Conscience and an Ancient 
Evil," the author gives an account of a little 
girl, the only child of a widowed mother, who 
sold newspapers in a disreputable neighbor- 
hood where dissolute people frequented the 
hotels. The child made a good deal of money 



White Slavery and Child Woman 83 

and the poor mother thought she was too young 
to understand the vile things which she might 
see. But a little later she was horrijfied to 
find that her child was familiar with vice, and, 
eventually, the girl became an inmate of one 
of the resorts where she had so long sold 
papers and gum. 

Another case cited is that of a woman who 
did a thriving business in a disreputable house, 
which was supplied largely by three or four 
little girls. They brought their girl friends to 
the house, and became so hardened by the 
money and the little fineries, candies and pres- 
ents they received that they did not seem to be 
seriously troubled when they knew that bring- 
ing their friends to this house would probably 
be their ruin. 

This constitutes one of the most appalling 
phases of the White Slave traffic, the holocaust 
of child victims, who are ruined before they are 
old enough to know the nature of evil; who, 
before reason or education can let the light into 
their minds, become hardened and toughened 
into insensibility. 

A physician connected with the New York 
Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Chil- 



X 



84 The Crime of Silence 

dren says it is horribly pathetic to learn how 
far a nickel or a quarter will go towards pur- 
chasing the virtue of young girls. In investi- 
gations of vice in New York it was found that 
a great many girls have been lured to pay for 
a merry-go-round ride, or admission to some 
picture show, with the price of their chastity! 

The vilest of men give young girls pennies 
and nickels on the street, and in business places, 
in order to become acquainted with them, to 
gain their confidence, and just these little 
things are the entering wedges to their ruin. 

It is unfortunate that many poor parents 
not only do not try to discourage their chil- 
dren from accepting money, or tickets for 
places of amusement, from strangers; but, 
when the children come home and tell them 
that a nice man gave them a ride on a hobby 
horse or on a merry-go-round, or gave them a 
ticket to a picture show, they seem to think 
that it is so much gained, that their children 
are fortunate in getting these things free. 
They do not realize the danger lurking in those 
seemingly innocent gifts. 

The vile men who lead innocent children 
astray know very well that there is nothing 



White Slavery and Child Woman 85 

else they love so much as fun and adventure; 
that they will do all sorts of things for a good 
time. Children's curiosity is very strong, and, 
their self-control being weak, they will go to 
almost unbehevable lengths to satisfy it. 
They want to see things ; they want to have ex- 
periences, and the agents of vice take advan- 
tage of this to exploit them. A child is a 
bundle of sensitive nerves athrill with the de- 
sire to see and to know, to play. Those who 
are lured by the promise of a little fun may 
have very little sunshine in their lives. Their 
surroundings may be discordant, vulgar and in- 
decent. An intemperate father may make 
their so-called home a hell on earth. They 
may really have no normal home life, may 
know little of love or aif ection, may have little 
or no outlet for their pent-up, fun-loving, ro- 
mance-craving energies. 

Is it strange that poor children, who seldom 
have a penny or a nickel of their own to spend 
as they please, should be lured into all sorts of 
places of amusement by free tickets? How 
often I have seen poor little ones standing 
about a merry-go-round, longing for a ride, a 
treat which, perhaps, they have never had in 



86 The Crime or Silence 

all their young lives. How they envy the more 
fortunate children ! How little they dream of 
evil in the kind stranger who offers to gratify 
their longing! 

City children are often allowed to go into 
disreputable houses to sell papers and gum to 
the inmates^ who are usually liberal to them, 
often declining to take change ; and the parents, 
in many cases, are so greedy to get the money 
which they bring home that they do not make 
proper efforts to keep them out of such places. 
Indeed, in some cities, even when the police 
have tried to protect them, the children 
actually have had special permits from the 
mayors, in response to appealing letters from 
the parents, pleading their great poverty, as 
an excuse for begging the special privilege of 
allowing their little ones to sell their wares in 
those dangerous houses. 

It is a disgrace to our civilization that inno- 
cent children should be so exposed to evil that 
in a multitude of cases they are almost sure of 
being led astray. 

Isn't it a shame that, in this land of oppor- 
tunity where there should be a fair chance and 
plenty for every human being, vast mul- 



White Slavery and Child Woman 87 

titudes of innocent children should be forced 
to live under conditions which are not fit for 
any human beings, which would be a severe 
test of the virtue and morality of grown men 
and women of clean, pure lives! 

Think of the tremendous danger to purity 
in the crowded, so-called homes of the poor, 
where often entire families are obliged to live 
in one or two rooms, where the sanitary condi- 
tions are most demoralizing, destructive alike 
to moral and physical health! Think of those 
foul tenement houses and underground cellars 
where the sun never enters, where the old and 
young of both sexes are thrown together with- 
out any distinction ; where very often poor par- 
ents take into, it may be, one room where there 
are already several children, a boarder or two 
to help pay the rent; and then let us ask our- 
selves. Is it any wonder that under such cir- 
cumstances the natural safeguards of reserve 
and modesty break down? Is it any wonder 
that with such conditions in the home, added 
to constant familiarity with vice and crime in 
their general environment, multitudes of chil- 
dren drift into disreputable careers? 

We call this a land of equal opportunity. 



88 The Crime of Silence 

But do those children, who are obliged to live in 
the very midst of vice during their most im- 
pressionable years, when every sight, every 
sound, every experience, is indelibly photo- 
graphed upon the growing brain, have a fair 
chance in life? Are those children who grow 
up to maturity with their minds saturated with 
impure experiences ; who live in an atmosphere 
of vice ; for whom evil is robbed of its hideous- 
ness by constant familiarity; who are reared 
with the idea that profanity, obscenity and sex- 
ual sin are not very bad, because ''everybody 
does it," — are those children responsible for 
their ultimate degradation and ruin? 

Just think, you well-to-do parents, if, under 
the most favorable conditions, where you can 
control the environment of your children and 
give them all the rights of childhood, many of 
you have such a struggle with them during the 
dangerous years when they are approaching 
and passing through puberty, what it must 
mean at this critical period for those other chil- 
dren who are struggling with their awakening 
passions amid associations which tend to arouse, 
to inflame the lowest animal instincts ! Think 
what it must mean to be constantly in an at- 



White Slavery and Child Woman 89 

mosphere where morbid imaginings are 
aroused by vile insinuations, the most vulgar 
allusions, sights, and suggestive experiences, in 
an environment where impurity is the rule of 
life! What are the chances for their surviv- 
ing years of such experiences and coming out 
clean, pure, and wholesome; when, perhaps, 
with all your care and the constant suggestion 
of purity and wholesome home environment, 
you may not be able to protect your own child 
from sexual defilement or degeneracy? 

Thousands of respectable, hard-working 
fathers and mothers with large families, living 
in cities, and earning small wages, must look 
for the cheapest possible rent, which is often 
found next to a saloon or near a disorderly 
house or a dance hall. How are those parents 
going to protect their young boys and girls 
from the dangers that surround them in such a 
neighborhood? 

In such poor homes too, there are no pro- 
visions for personal cleanliness, for taking a 
bath; and uncleanliness is a factor in develop- 
ing impurity. Yet many of the children in 
those homes grow up almost without knowing 
what a real, thorough bath means. Absolute 



90 The Crime oe Silence 

cleanliness of person; clean, wholesome, 
hygienic surroundings ; plenty of healthful ex- 
ercise, physical and mental; a lot of innocent 
play and wholesome fun, — these are things 
which tend to keep the mind pure. What 
chance have the children of the slums for get- 
ting them? 

Again, thousands of poor mothers are 
obliged to go out to work in the daytime, and 
must leave their little ones exposed to all the 
vile influences at work in their poverty-stricken 
neighborhood during their absence. The loss 
of the mother's care, especially when she is in- 
telligent and has been well trained, is a very 
great factor in children going to the bad ; for, 
while there are many exceptions, it is the rule 
that neglected children who grow up in the 
midst of temptation and are familiar with evil 
are, in the end, likely to become victims of their 
environment. 

"I can recall a very intelligent woman," says 
Jane Addams, ' Vho long brought her children 
to the Hull House day nursery. The little 
girl is almost totally deaf, owing to neglect fol- 
lowing a case of measles, when her mother 
could not stop work in order to care for her; 



White Slavery and Child Woman 91 

the youngest boy has lost a leg flipping cars; 
the oldest has twice been arrested for petty 
larceny; the twin boys, in spite of prolonged 
sojourns in the truant school, have been such 
habitual truants that their natural intelligence 
has secured but little aid from education. Of 
the five children three now are in semi-penal 
institutions supported by the State. It would 
not, therefore," she added, ''have been so un- 
economical to have boarded them with their 
own mother, requiring a standard of nutrition 
and school attendance at least up to the na- 
tional standard of nurture which the more ad- 
vanced European governments are establish- 
ing." 

When will our country, which boasts of its 
equal opportunities, free its mothers from the 
slavery of poverty and allow them to care for 
their own children, to rear them in hygienic, 
sanitary and moral decency? 

Think of allowing a mother to work out for 
fifty cents a day, when her influence upon her 
children during that time, even measured solely 
by its economic value to the State, bears no 
legitimate comparison to the wretched pittance 
she earns! 



92 The Crime or Silence 

Just imagine, you happy, well-to-do parents, 
what these poor mothers, who work themselves 
to death for their children, suffer when they 
feel that, in spite of all their efforts and sacri- 
fices, their little ones are slipping away be- 
cause of the evil associations and vicious influ- 
ences brought to bear upon them during their 
enforced absence! 

The time will come when the State will find 
that it is at a perilous cost that it allows 
mothers to bring up children during their spare 
time, in the evenings, at night, after they have 
done hard days' work washing and scrubbing, 
or after toiling long hours in factories. It will 
find that it does not pay to allow women who 
are sacrificing their lives for their children to 
be compelled to leave them to chance during 
the daytime, while they are obliged for a ridicu- 
lous compensation to do that for which they 
are, perhaps, totally unfitted, thus robbing their 
little ones of that mother-love and mother-in- 
fluence which would tend to shape their lives 
into usefulness, and make them good citizens. 
What a tragedy, what a reflection upon our 
civilization, that such things are necessary ! 

"Save the children and you save the nation," 



White Slavery and Child Woman 93 

said Marcus M. Marks, borough president of 
Manhattan, in a speech at the opening of a 
Hebrew kindergarten and day nursery in New 
York City. "Philanthropy for the benefit of 
the old serves individuals only, but work for the 
young affects generations yet unborn." 

That is the crux of this whole question: in 
caring for the children of to-day we are insur- 
ing well-born children in the future, the ad- 
vancement of the whole race. As Rabbi M. 
Hyamson of London, said in speaking of simi- 
lar work in England, ''The work of day nur- 
series provides for better children of the future 
as well as for better children in the present." 

'Tf children are not brought up well," said 
ex-President Roosevelt, ''they are not merely 
a curse to themselves, but they mean the ruin 
of the State in the future." 

Some time ago scientists traced the cost to 
the State of New York of the descendants of 
a single criminal woman, made so largely 
through neglect, insufficient nourishment and 
lack of training in childhood. There were 
thousands of these degenerate descendants, and 
their crimes, trials, and penitentiary expenses 
have cost the State over a million dollars. 



94 The Crime oe Silence 

A comparatively few dollars in the proper 
training of the ancestors of these costly crimi- 
nals might have saved all this. 

It is possible not only to save young lives 
from the horrors and evils of impurity, but 
pretty nearly all the crime with its awful cost 
and demoraliz^ation to the community could 
be prevented if we would only take the children 
in charge, and insist at the outset upon a health- 
ful rearing, proper hygienic environment, 
proper playgrounds, proper recreation and 
chaperonage during their minority. The de- 
moralization of children takes place within a 
comparatively few years when they are very 
impressionable, at an age when they ought to 
have and are entitled to have the best possible 
training. 

When we remember that the minds of chil- 
dren are like the sensitive plates of a photog- 
rapher, recording every thought or suggestion 
to which they are exposed, we must realize 
how important it is that they should hear and 
see only that which will make for nobility of 
character, for beauty, and for truth. It is the 
things that are seen and heard and learned in 
childhood that make up the character and deter- 



White Slavery and Child Woman 95 

mine the future possibilities of the man and 
woman. 

Think of a child reared in the contaminating 
atmosphere of the slums of a great city where 
everything is dripping with suggestions of vul- 
garity and wickedness of every description! 
Think of its young mind being constantly filled 
with profanity, obscenity, and filth! Think 
of what it hears and sees, what it has indeliblv 
impressed on its plastic imagination every day, 
every hour of its young Ufe! Then contrast 
such a child with one that is brought up in an 
atmosphere of purity, refinement, and culture ; 
whose mind is continually filled with noble, 
uplifting suggestions of the true, the pure, and 
the beautiful! What a difference in the fate 
of the two children, and without any effort or 
choice whatever of their own! One mind is 
trained downward, toward darkness ; the other, 
upward, toward the light. What chance has 
the first to develop a noble character when all 
of its first impressionable years are saturated 
with the suggestions of evil with which its en- 
vironment reeks, when quarreling, bickering, 
foul language, indecency, — all that is low and 
degrading continually fills its ears and eyes? 



96 The Crime of Silence 

How long will we suffer children to be 
brought up under such conditions and then 
punish them when they develop into crooks and 
criminals? How long will the State continue 
to build prisons and asylums for degenerates, 
to expend far more money in housing and feed- 
ing the criminal classes than would be required 
to save the children before they become degen- 
erate ? 

There are, it is true, signs of an awakening. 
The women's movement is making itself felt in 
this, as in all other great questions looking to- 
ward the uplift of mankind. Their activities 
in behalf of women and children are arousing 
legislatures all over the country. The State is 
beginning to discover that the children are her 
greatest asset, which she can not afford to 
waste through neglect, or bad rearing on the 
part of unfortunate or degenerate parents. 
She realizes that something must be done to 
chaperone or properly mother all her neglected 
children during the perilous years when their 
self-control is undeveloped and their passions 
insistent and imperative, instead of letting 
them go to the bad. 

Neither the State nor the individual, not one 



White Slavery and Child Woman 97 

of us can shirk our share of responsibility for 
the terrible sacrifice of innocent children to the 
evils in our midst, especially to that most ter- 
rible of all human ills — ^white slavery. 



CHAPTER VI 

HOW THE SLATE MART IS SUPPLIED 

Is there, in human farm, that bears a heart, — 

A wretch ! a villain ! lost to love and truth ! 
That can, with studied, sly, ensnaring art, 

Betray sweet Jenny's unsuspecting youth? 
Curse on his perjured arts, dissembling smooth! 

Are honor, virtue, conscience, all exiled? 
Is there no pity, no relenting ruth. 

Points to the parents fondling o'er their child. 
Then paints the ruined maid, and their distraction wild? 

— Robert Burns. 

Neither man nor angel can discern 
Hypocrisy, the only evil that walks 
Invisible, except to God alone. 
By his permissive will, through heaven and earth. 

— JOHK MiLTON". 

In response to the demand that the "social 
evil," or to give it its proper name, prostitution, 
be legalized in our country and its victims 
licensed. Dr. Howard Kelly, in a vigorous pro- 
test, said: ''Where shall we look to recruit the 
ever-faihng ranks of these poor creatures as 
they die yearly by tens of thousands ? Which 

98 



How THE Slaye Mart Is Supplied 99 

of the little girls of our land shall we designate 
for this traffic? Mark their sweet innocence 
to-day as they run about in our streets and 
parks, prattling and playing, ever busy about 
nothing; which of them shall we snatch as they 
approach maturity, to supply this foul mart?" 

Think of the greatest nations in the world, 
England, France, Germany, and other Euro- 
pean countries protecting or legalizing this in- 
famous traffic in the bodies and souls of 
women under the plea that it is necessary for 
the well-being of men ! 

For centuries English government authori- 
ties have sanctioned the "social evil" in the 
army and navy, and have established measures 
to protect the health of the soldiers and sailors ; 
but they have felt no concern whatever about 
the fate of the women sacrificed to the system. 
"The government," says an authoritative 
writer on the subject, ''is directly responsible 
for a large measure of white slavery. It is, 
in effect, a procurer of women for the vicious 
pleasures of men in the army and navy. . . . 

"Many of the white slaves of these brothels 
[in British India] sanctioned and supervised 
by the government are, it is said, mere children. 



100 The Crime or Silence 

How are they obtained, and what happens to 
them when they become hopelessly diseased 
and thus 'unfit for use by the officers and sol- 
diers'?" 

When the English opponents of this awful 
prostitution of the power of the State made 
their great fight to induce the government to 
repeal the terrible Contagious Disease Act re- 
lating to the garrison towns of Great Britain, 
where it permitted and legalized sexual vice, 
they were subjected to all sorts of insults and 
abuse for meddling with a custom which had 
been entrenched in military camps for genera- 
tions ! 

We have broken away from many of the 
harmless customs and traditions of the mother 
country. Isn't it time that we broke away 
from a vile precedent like this? 

Our civilization is responsible for the great 
moral evil. There was no such thing as prosti- 
tution among the primitive tribes, and it is un- 
known in the hot climates where people go 
practically naked. The mystery with which we 
surround sex and the morbid curiosity aroused 
by the suggestion of dress seem to play no in- 
considerable part in the perversion of the 



How THE Slave Mart Is Supplied 101 

grandest, the sublimest human instinct ; that in- 
stinct which, when properly used and kept 
clean and pure, blossoms out into beauty, into 
all that is most healthful and noble in life, but 
which, when abused, misused, perverted, leads 
to the greatest degradation of which himian be- 
ings are capable. 

But the civilized governments of the world 
which either legalize and sanction vice or wink 
at it and encourage it in their young men, are 
responsible for many of its worst phases to-day. 

Dr. Martindale, author of ''Under the Sur- \ 
face," quotes a British ex-official who for many I 
years had charge of the government brothels, 
or chaklas, as they are called in India, as fol- 
lows : — 

''I can not speak too strongly against them. 
Many a young boy or man comes out to India 
pure and good. It is the presence of the gov- 
ernment chaklas that first put it into his head 
to lead a vicious life. Many resist for a time, 
but when they see their friends and their 
superior officers making use of them, and when 
they are given to understand that the medical 
inspection makes it safe for them to go to them, 
sooner or later they give way and follow the 



102 The Crime or Silence 

example of the rest. But to start with, — they 
don't want to'' 

Think of a great Christian government ac- 
tually seducing its young men ! Is it any won- 
der that the evil flourishes in India, in Eng- 
land, and in our own country, where, if it is 
not legalized, procurers, debauchers of both 
young men and young women are so lightly 
dealt with! 

''Be not afraid of them that kill the body, 
and after that have no more that they can do,'' 
said Christ to his apostles; ''but I will forewarn 
you whom ye shall fear. Fear him who after 
he hath killed hath power to cast into hell ; yea, 
I say unto you, fear him." 

But in Christian America the man who kills 
the body is electrocuted, while those who make 
a business of killing the souls of young girls are 
practically immune from any punishment. 

During the recent exposure of the white 
slave traffic in New York City, it was found 
that the men who live in luxury from the profits 
of women's ruin and degradation have a regu- 
lar systematized plan for securing "new ma- 
terial." 

They ply their vile business even at the very 



How THE Slaye Mart Is Supplied 103 

doors of our schoolhouses. "Cadets," as the 
male procurers are called, hang around the 
schools at the time of closing and try to flirt y 
with the more attractive girls, who are flattejcgd 
by the notice of these young men, who often 
dress in the height of fashion. In many cases 
they get into conversation with the schoolgirls, 
give them cards and invite them to call at their 
apartments, or they invite them to the theatre, 
to picture shows, to automobile rides, to dinner 
in some fashionable place, where they often in- 
duce them to drink and thus get them in their 
power, 

A clergyman in New York reports a tj^pical 
case where one of those "cadets" inveigled two 
schoolgirls to visit his apartment, and it was 
found that they had been going there regularly 
for some time when their parents discovered it. 

After a girl has once yielded to the temp- 
tation to do an imprudent thing, her pride 
keeps her from making a confidant of her 
mother or any one else ; and the fascination, the 
exhilaration of the new experience, arouses her 
curiosity and the desire to repeat it until the 
first thing she knows she is charmed beyond 
her own control, and led to her ruin. 



104 The Crime of Silence 

In many instances it is the girl's very inno- 
cence and her love of romance that are her 
undoing; the fact that she is unsophisticated, 
and does not know that these men are experts 
in their vile trade, hypnotizing and fascinating 
girls just as serpents charm birds until they 
drop off from the trees. Sometimes ''cadets" J 
will work on an attractive girl for months be- 
fore they ''land" her, as they say, because they 
know that she is valuable in proportion to her j 
attractiveness. ' 

It is well known that in our large cities cer- 
tain low theatrical agencies are in league with 
disreputable houses. A prominent social 
worker tells the story of two fine young Eng- 
lish girls, one sixteen, the other seventeen, who 
had gained extraordinary skill in juggling, and 
who came to this country under an agreement 
with a theatrical manager to pay them five 
shillings ($1.25) a week and their expenses. 
This manager became stranded in the West, | 
and the girls were turned loose. They applied 
to a theatrical agen-cy in Chicago for positions, 
and were sent to a disreputable house where a 
vaudeville programme was given every night. 
They took the position in good faith, not know- 



How THE Slave Mart Is Supplied 105 

ing, of course, the character of the house. 
When they did reahze the nature of the place 
they became frightened and managed to escape 
from the dressing room while they were await- 
ing their turn to go on the stage. They got 
out on the street and appealed to policemen 
for protection. They were sent to the Juve- 
nile Protective Association. 

Many unprincipled agents bring colo red 
girls to our Northern cities from the South. 
They sometimes pay the girls' fares, and, if 
they do not succeed in getting good situations 
immediately, so that they can return the money 
advanced to them— often an exorbitant sum, — 
they are sent as waitresses and chambermaids 
to disreputable houses. They are ignorant of 
the character of these places until, perhaps, it is 
too late for them to protest; and even if they 
do, they may be forced to remain there under 
threats of police intervention or of personal 
violence until they can pay back the money. 
In the meantime the girls grow so accustomed 
to their vile surroundings that their hideous- 
ness gradually diminishes, their sensibilities be- 
come hardened, and they often enter the life 
themselves. Unscrupulous employment bu- 



106 The Crime of Silence 

reaus often send colored girls to disreputable 
houses when they would not dare so to treat 
white girls. 

One reason why so many colored girls go 
wrong is because they are only a few genera- 
tions removed from slavery, in which state no 
regard was paid to their sex. It has only been 
a short time since they began to exercise their 
self-control. They have had comparatively lit- 
tle responsibility along the line of legitimate 
motherhood. When we remember their many 
generations of bondage, their necessarily un- 
stable marriage and parental relations, the 
frightfully illicit example their slave masters 
set them, the fact that they are still looked 
upon as an inferior race, and that they are 
usually poor and live in depraved neighbor- 
hoods, where the children are an easy prey to 
demoralizing influences, it, is quite remarkable 
that, as a whole, the colored people are as 
moral, as conscientious as they are to-day. 

A large proportion of the victims of white 
slavery are from farms and smaller towns in 
the country. They are more easily duped by 
the wiles of the procurers than city girls, and 
their identity is more easily hidden; besides, 



How THE Slave Mart Is Supplied 107 

they are more readily controlled, because they 
do not know much about city life. Many of 
these young girls are led to their doom in just 
trying to see what the wor ld is lik e. They 
have been kept close to the home and know 
almost nothing of life. When they get away 
and get a little more liberty, love of romance 
and adventure and their ignorance lead them 
astray. 

These girls from the country never have been 
taught that a young girl, friendless and alone 
in a large city, is in gTcater danger than she 
would be alone with the wi ld beasts in the 
jungles of Africa; that thousands of men are 
watching for just such girls as they, waiting to 
lure them to their ruin, setting all sorts of traps 
for them. They are never told, perhaps, that 
thirty thousand men in New Yo rk Cit y alone, 
not to speak of Chicago, Boston, St. Louis, 
and other big centres, makej^ t a profe ssion to 
lure just such innocent young girls int o sin , 
an3 that many of them become rich in this aw- 
ful traffic in human lives. 

The country girl who has been accustomed to 
a quiet, simple life is often thrown off her guard 
by the glitter of the city, the evidences of luxu- 



108 The Crime of Silence 

rious living, — beautiful dresses, fine automo- 
biles, and people everywhere on pleasure bent. 
She is dazzled by these things and often loses 
her mental balance. 

Such an unsophisticated, inexperienced girl 
is easily enticed to public dance halls, where 
young men who are experts in misleading girls 
often induce her to drink, and the proprietor 
purposely makes it very difficult to get water 
in these places. The dances last only four or 
five minutes, because the chief aim of the halls 
is to get the inmates to buy drinks. Thou- 
sands of girls are thus induced to drink, and, 
before they realize it, the hour is late and the 
young men persuade them that they can not 
afford to go home, but that they can explain 
the next morning that they stayed with their 
friends. 

In other words, the most damnable methods 
are used to play upon the credulity and the 
vanity of these young girls. As a rule, of 
course, the girls know nothing about the char- 
acter of the men who are trying to ruin them ; 
who tell them, especially if they are attractive, 
that it is a shame that such handsome girls 
should not have diamonds and beautiful clothes, 



How THE Slave Mart Is Supplied 109 

and thus play upon their vanity. They often 
make them beheve that they can get places for 
them on the vaudeville or theatrical stage, and 
that they will introduce them to managers, 
etc. These bogus managers are in the game 
with the ''cadets," and, under the pretense of 
helping the girls to positions, lead them farther 
and farther to their ruin. 

There are six hundred public dance halls in 
Chicago, and probably more than a thousand 
in New York. The majority of them are con- 
nected directly with saloons, and in all of them 
lig[uors are sold. Bad men feel pretty sure of 
a girl if they can persuade her to take a drink, 
and the fact that the girls go to the dance halls 
when weary after a hard day's work, makes it 
all the easier for them to be induced to do so on 
the plea that a drink will brace them up. 

Drugs and alcohol are the most potent aids 
of the white slave traffic. Many of its victims 
say that they could not endure their horrible 
life without the deadening influence of alcohol, 
opiimi, or cocaine. 

"Whoever has tried to help a girl who is mak- 
ing an effort to leave the irregular life she has 
led," said Jane Addams, ''must have been dis- 



110 The Crime of Silence 

couraged by the victim's attempts to overcome 
using alcohol and drugs. Such a girl has com- 
monly been drawn into this life in the first place 
when under the influence of liquor, and has 
continued to drink that she might be able to 
live through each day. The drink habit grows 
upon her, for she is constantly required to sell 
liquors and to be treated." 

When General Bingham was police commis- 
sioner of New York, he said, ''There is not 
enough depravity in human nature to keep 
alive this very large business. The immoral- 
ity of women and the brutishness of men have 
to be persuaded, coaxed and consta ntly stim u: 
lated in order to keep the soci al evi l in its pres- 
ent state of prosperity." 

If the Government should prohibit the sale of 
liquors in disreputable houses, sever all con- 
nection between the saloon, the dance hall and 
these places of vice, severely punish proprietors 
of disreputable houses whenever liquor was 
found on the premises, sold or brought there, it 
would be a tremendous blow to the worst traffic 
that ever cursed the earth. 

The whole white slave business has been 
forced because it was found profitable. Men 



How THE Slave Mart Is Supplied 111 

who are mean and stingy in their homes, are 
liberal and even reckless in their expenditures 
on vice. When a man's senses are deadened 
with drink, and his mind sodden with bestial 
orgies, money does not mean much to him. 
This is where the unfortunates who have been 
ruined endeavor to be revenged on the men 
who first led them astray. They ply them 
with drink and force their bestiality in every 
possible way, to increase their income. This 
fact, together with the twenty-five per cent, 
profit on every drop of liquor sold, makes al- 
cohol the greatest asset in the white slave trade. 

The most hopeless thing in the underworld 
is the sordid love of money, the selfish desire 
for a life of ease, which tempts so many young 
men to make a profession of exploiting white 
slaves. When, moreover, one young man 
makes a success of ruining fellow beings, his 
associates find it out and each one thinks there 
is an opportunity for him also to make an easy 
living in the same way. Greed and selfishness 
so grow upon these men in their demoralizing 
traffic that they become inhumanly cruel. 

Many of the wretched white slaves support 
in luxury and idleness the men who have ruined 



112 The Crime of Silence 

them, and these very men whom they thus sup- 
port by the profits of their shame often treat 
them most brutally, driving them out into the 
night in all sorts of weather, and snatching 
from them nearly every penny of their miser- 
able earnings on their return. 

Not long ago a girl was found in a vicious 
resort in New York who was so far gone with 
tuberculosis that she was subject to severe 
hemorrhages; and, because she refused to go 
out in the cold and storm, her slave owner was 
seen to strike her in the face as she was having 
a bad coughing spasm. At one o'clock in the 
morning he pushed her out of the door into the 
street, telling her that if she did not bring him 
money before morning he would renounce his 
police protection and she should go to prison. 

Think of such damnable business being car- 
ried on right under our noses in what we call 
one of the most civilized cities in the world! 
African slavery was a race blessing in compari- 
son with this nefarious trade ! 

The procurers in many cases are protected 
by the police, and the girls are kept in constant 
horror lest their masters withdraw their pro- 



How THE Slave Mart Is Supplied 113 

tection and turn them over to the pohce for 
arrest and imprisonment. Fear is the club 
held over tens of thousands of these unfortu- 
nates. 

The young men in this wretched business are 
usually well dressed and spend their money 
freely. They say that they live in the better 
part of the city and belong to good families, 
and will often tell girls they are trying to en- 
trap that their parents want them t o marr y 
ric h society giris . but that they would very 
much rather marry girls who work for a living, 
who do not put on so many airs. Many are 
thus lured into slavery by these men making 
love to them and pretending that they want 
to marry them. The girls become infatuated, 
and the young men deceive them. 

Very few women would ever go wrong be- 
cause of their animality alone. It is her ten- 
der side, her gentle, romantic side which makes 
woman the easy victim of a scoundrel. He 
plays upon her most sacred instincts, — her ma- 
ternal instinct, her longing for a home, her 
yearning for affection. These, and not pas- 
sion, are the chief assets upon which the pro- 



114 The Crime or Silence 

curer plies his damnable -trade. It is woman's 
tenderest feelings that oftenest lead to her 
downfall. 

Such is the fate of artless maid. 
Sweet floweret of the rural shade ! 
By love's simplicity betrayed, 

And guileless trust. 
Till she, like thee, all soiled, is laid 
Low i' the dust. 
— Robert Burks. — "To a Mountain Daisy." 



CHAPTER VII 

SMUGGLING POISONED GOODS 

Gracious gods, grant that I may be beautiful within. 

— Socrates. 

He that has light within his own clear breast 
May sit i' the centre, and enjoy bright day. 

— John MiLTOK. 

It has been said that great writers are usu- 
ally distinguished by their power of setting the 
reader's mind to the active making of images. 
This is also unfortunately true of a class of 
writers who have no just claim to greatness, 
whose pernicious productions have done more 
to debauch the imagination of young people 
than any other one thing. 

The most dangerous writers in the English 
language are those whose artful insinuations 
and mischievous polish reflect upon the mind 
the image of im.purity without presenting the 
impurity itself. A plain vulgarity in a writer 
is its own antidote. It is like a foe who attacks 

115 



116 The Crime of Silence 

us openly and gives us opportunity for defence. 
But impurity, secreted under beauty, under 
seductive attractiveness, is like a treacherous 
friend who strolls with us in a garden and de- 
stroys us by the odor of poisonous flowers prof- 
fered to our senses. 

If the writers of suggestive fiction, fiction 
that presents the allurement of sex veiled in 
language none of whose words are actually im- 
pure, could see the miserable human wrecks 
they have made, the multitudes of splendid 
girls they have through their pages lured to, 
their doom, the splendid young men whom they 
have led to sexual abuse, self -defilement, and 
all other sorts of sexual sin, if they did not 
drop dead from heart failure at the tragic 
sight, they would, at least, exile themselves to 
some distant place where they never again 
could look upon those whom they have ruined. 

There is another class of writers exploiting 
the sex question who seem to think it necessary 
to open up sewers and uncover filthy places in 
order to show that they are unsanitary and 
dangerous. Some of these people are taking 
advantage of the movement towards a higher 
morality to give the world needless descriptions 



Smuggling Poisoned Goods 117 

and portrayals of places where so many youths 
are ruined. They are presenting vivid and 
wholly unnecessary pictures of the interiors of 
brothels and gambling dens, thus doing much 
harm instead of good. They seem to think that 
following these lurid descriptions with a few 
moral precepts will excuse the indecent temp- 
tations and evil suggestions which they drag 
into their writings. They do not try to give 
the young a clean, sweet, wholesome idea of 
the relation of sexes, but go just as near the 
illicit, the forbidden as possible, while still 
evading the law for circulation purposes. Like 
some French writers, they go just as near the 
indecent as possible without actually crossing 
the lines that would bar them from publication 
or circulation through the mails. Many of 
them have a wonderful art of insinuating and 
suggesting vicious pictures and situations 
which they do not actually express in words, 
and this suggestion of the vile is infinitely worse 
than the expression of it, because it stimulates 
an unwholesome curiosity and feeds a morbid 
imagination. 

A very sensible woman, recently speaking 
of immoral filth of this sort which has passed 



118 The Crime oe Silence 

our censors of morals and appeared not only in 
books, but also in some of our periodicals, in- 
dignantly declared that it was simply ''smug- 
gling poison past the guards." 

Unfortunately much of this immoral sug- 
gestion of unscrupulous writers is smuggled 
into homes and finds its way to library shelves, 
and thus the printed page becomes the most 
subtle menace to the unformed minds, the vivid, 
questioning imaginations of the young. 

Many playwrights and theatre managers, as 
well as writers of fiction and magazine articles, 
are also finding it very profitable to cater to 
morbid sexual desires. The same tendency 
visible in the worst forms of literature is seen in 
some of our theatres and moving picture shows. 
Playwrights and managers are presenting 
questionable plays, that just escape being il- 
legal; plays that are pernicious enemies of so- 
ciety and lead to infinite harm. Their authors 
try to justify the dragging of this moral filth 
before the public by superadding a moral em- 
phasizing the necessity for better sex educa- 
tion. 

The same is true of suggestiveness in art. 
Many impure artists have made their fortunes 



Smuggling Poisoned Goods 119 

and their reputations, such as they were or are, 
^upon forbidden ground, going just as near the 
I point of legal prohibition as possible. 

All these things have a most vicious influence 
upon the nervous system and the morals of 
growing youth, and parents should do every- 
thing in their power to counteract it. They 
should not only censor the plays and amuse- 
lent places which their children attend, but 
' also the books which they read and the sensual 
I scandal-monger ing newspapers with their nau- 
I seating details of divorce trials, murders^ sui- 
[cides, and general criminal records, which so 
[many young boys and girls devour with avid- 

[ity. 

It is a thousand pities that the tragedies 

^wrought by impure literature, vile pictures, 

land suggestive plays could not be brought 

home to their writers and producers, who 

; should be scourged in public, and ever after 

ostracized by all decent people. 

''Keep the imagination clean," said Haw- 
thorne ; "that is one of the truest conditions of 
communion with heaven." 

Mrs. Arthur Macy, who has been eyes, ears, 
and hands for Helen Keller during all her 



120 The Crime oe Silence 

years of training, says that, in one way at least, 
her blindness has been a good thing for this 
wonderful girl, because it has shut her out 
from the world of newspaper trash, the temp- 
tation to read the cheap, flippant, senseless ar- 
ticles in poor periodicals, and the great mass of 
vicious books and silly superficial "literature" 
with which the press is nowadays flooded. 
Owing to her afflictions, all of her reading has 
been most carefully selected. Her time has 
been too valuable to be worse than wasted in 
reading questionable novels, those which dwell 
upon topics of impurity and immorality. 
Her mind has never been tainted by impure 
suggestions or attractive pictures of evil. 
Her imagination has been kept wonderfully 
pure and clean by the constant inspiration of 
high ideals. Her acquaintances in literature 
have been of the highest type of authors, the 
most instructive, helpful, a ad uplifting. She 
has been spared the frightful blight of the sex- 
ual taint, which poisons the ears, the eyes, and 
the minds of so many young people to-day. 

Childhood is the story age of life. The 
mind of a growing child delights in pure ro- 
mance, and too much care can not be exercised 



Smuggling Poisoned Goods 121 

in the selection of its literature. The story-tell- 
ing movement in our city libraries is one of the 
most admirable in our educational system. It 
introduces children to the world's masterpieces 
in literature and holds up for their example the 
highest ideals of life and conduct. If all par- 
ents had the time and the culture necessary 
to have a story hour for their children, there 
could be no better means of training their 
young imaginations or of impressing their 
minds with pure and lofty ideals. 

Whatever else you do, don't allow your chil- 
dren to read exciting, trashy novels, blood-and- 
thunder stories, or cheap suggestive fiction, or 
'to attend low picture shows or questionable 
plays. Boys especially should not be allowed 
to go to amusements which would tend to in- 
flame the imagination. There are many 
vaudeville entertainments and picture shows 
that have a most unfortunate effect upon the 
boyish imagination. People little realize what 
they are doing when they allow their children, 
boys or girls, to see all sorts of plays and at- 
tend dances, where they are up late at night, 
and to do many other things in which not even 
adults can safely indulge. 



122 The Crime of Silence 

If, where parents are indifferent, ignorant, 
or not adequate to do so, the State could prop- 
erly supervise its youthful wards through the 
dangerous years of adolescence and keep away 
from them filthy, vulgar conversation, obscene 
pictures, and books frankly impure, even 
though they do not contain an improper word, 
that inflame the imagination, the morals of our 
people would be immeasurably raised; impur- 
ity would be largely stamped out. 

If young people only realized what a terrible 
thing it is to get even a suggestion of impurity 
into the mind, they would never read an author 
whose lines drip with the very gall of death, 
or look at a picture that suggests evil. 

One of the strangest things in human experi- 
ence is the persistence, the insistence, the in- 
delibility of bad things. Vicious stories, indeli- 
cate, vulgar jokes, impure suggestions, will 
pass over a whole continent and cross oceans, 
when a good thing, that which would inspire 
and uplift men, would travel at a snail's pace. 
Scandal will spread over a community like 
wildfire, whereas the good things said about 
our neighbors travel very slowly. 

It is said that the mind's phonograph will 



Smuggling Poisoned Goods 123 

faithfully reproduce a bad or impure story 
even up to the point of death. Many of our 
bishops and prominent clergymen have testi- 
fied to the fact that the vicious things which 
they saw and heard back in their childhood 
come to them with all their original vividness 
in their most holy moments, when at their devo- 
tions and even when preaching funeral 
services. A distinguished preacher told me 
that an impure book was shown him when a 
boy, and that, although he had it in his sight 
but a few moments, he would, in after life, have 
parted with his right hand, if by so doing he 
could have blotted out its influence from his 
mind. 

The great artist, Sir Peter Lely, refused to 
look upon a bad or inferior picture, because he 
declared that it would affect his standards and 
mar his ideals. 

"I'd give my right hand," says John G. 
Gough, "if I could forget that which I have 
learned from impure associates, if I could tear 
from my brains the scenes which I have wit- 
nessed, the transactions which have taken place 
before me." 

The tenacity, the indelibility of impure 



124 The Crime of Silence 

things no one yet has been able to explain, and 
for this reason it means everything to the fu- 
ture of boys and girls to keep such things out 
of their minds, to forbid their entrance, — to 
avoid impurity in every form. 

A mayor of Philadelphia said he could rid 
the jails of two-thirds of the boy criminals in 
the next year if he could banish bad plays from 
the boards of the variety theatres and put bad 
books out of print. An officer of the British 
government declares that nearly all the boys 
brought before the criminal courts owe their 
downfall to impure reading. 

It is probable that the careers of nearly 
every criminal in our prisons to-day would 
have been entirely different if the character of 
their reading when young had been different. 
It is impossible to estimate the damage which 
results from the poisoning of the mind in youth 
by vicious books or the suggestion of any form 
of impurity stamped upon the plastic brain. 

Wounds of the body are nothing in compari- 
son with wounds of the imagination which are 
rarely entirely healed. Physical mutilation is 
a boon compared with mutilation of the im- 
agination. The hideous images, the vicious 



Smuggling Poisoned Goods 125 

suggestions which come from a bad book, a bad 
picture, or a bad play, if they do not cripple or 
mar our career, may torment and haunt us all 
through life. Religion itself, the constant 
practice of virtue, can not erase impure pic- 
tures indelibly imprinted on the youthful im- 
agination. 

A story is told of an archbishop of London 
who in his youth had his curiosity aroused to 
see some immoral, unsightly picture which was 
being displayed among his youthful compan- 
ions. Many years after, when raised to the 
archbishopric, he was one day giving a sermon 
on ''Purity," and this vile picture which he had 
looked upon in his college days would con- 
stantly come up in his mind to torment him and 
call him a hypocrite. He bitterly deplored 
his boyish curiosity and vainly wished that he 
had then possessed the knowledge of his later 
life, which would have made him immune to 
the temptation to look at any immoral thing. 

One glance at a vulgar, indecent picture 
will make an unfading impression on the mind ; 
the life purpose may be changed, the outlook 
transformed, the aim completely reversed, but 
the hideous images and vile suggestions which 



126 The Crime of Silence 

were allowed to creep into the young life still 
persist in old age. They drag their foul pres- 
ence into the most sacred experiences of life. 
They survive the years without a loss of tint or 
vividness, or of a shade of vile suggestiveness. 
They survive in the memory when ten thousand 
useful things have faded away, — even when a 
large part of our education has been forgotten. 
These enemies of purity seem to defy every- 
thing holy in life. 

Chemists tell us that scarlet is the only color 
which can not be bleached. There is no known 
chemical which can remove it. So, when the 
sacred writer wished to emphasize the power of 
divine forgiveness, of divine love, he said: 
''Even though thy sins be as scarlet, they shall 
be made white as wool!" It takes omnipotent 
power to expunge impurity from the mind. 
Only divine love itself can bleach out of the 
character the sin of impurity. 

Yet many people, and, I am sorry to say, 
among them clergymen, think that they must 
see evil, that they must visit questionable 
places, that they must go into the vile dens of 
the cities, into the houses of immorality, in 



Smuggling Poisoned Goods 127 

order to see for themselves the hideousness of 
vice so that they may know how to rebuke and 
correct it. 

There are multitudes who are very particu- 
lar about the scrupulous cleanliness of their 
bodies, who could not be induced to miss their 
morning bath, but who wallow in mental sen- 
suality, who indulge in perpetual debauches, 
in visualizing sin, and who never take a mental 
purity bath. Those people outwardly live 
moral Kves; they do not drink nor visit im- 
moral resorts, nor indulge in profane lan- 
guage, nor overstep the limits of propriety in 
any direction, but they live in perpetual mental 
sin. They are physically moral, extremely 
fastidious about their bodies, but they feed 
their minds upon the grossest pictures and 
plays, the filthiest literature they can get hold 
of. They do not realize that it is a thousand 
times worse to take filth into the mind than to 
take it into the body. Physical filth is noth- 
ing compared with mental and moral filth, tak- 
ing into the mind the leaven of impurity. 

As a matter of fact there is a direct con- 
nection between purity of mind and health of 



128 The Crime of Silence 

body. Moral filth is abnormal ; it poisons and 
demoralizes the physical as well as the mental 
being, the body as well as the mind. 

The blood can not be kept clean and pure 
unless the thought is kept clean and pure. If 
the mind is saturated with uncleanness, if there 
is forbidden picturing constantly going on in 
the imagination, the blood will become vitiated. 
No one can ever estimate the fearful blight 
with which a perverted and diseased mentality 
will curse the entire life. 

The imagination may be a source of vilest 
contagion. Keep it sane, pure, and whole- 
some, and you will have taken the most im- 
portant step in building a noble character. I 
have found that impure stories, evil sugges- 
tions, indecent pictures, and the vulgar 
innuendoes of the impure minded are repulsive 
to children who have been intelligently and 
carefully educated regarding sex matters. 
Every child should be so trained against im- 
purity, vulgarity, and every suggestion of 
obscenity that these things, instead of attract- 
ing, will disgust him, so that he will be immune 
from contaminating suggestion in whatever 
form it may be presented to him. 



Smuggling Poisoned Goods 129 

It is a most dangerous and cruel thing to 
keep pernicious literature in the home, within 
reach of growing boys or girls. It may make 
all the difference in their lives between purity 
and impurity, between happiness and misery. 

We can hardly realize what a clean imagina- 
tion in youth means, or how it will affect the 
whole career. The character and success of 
many a man would be very materially marred, 
if we were to eliminate from his life the great 
inspiring books he has read. Who, for in- 
stance, could tell what his life and character, 
and the history of this country would have been 
had Lincoln read dime novels and yellow-cov- 
ered literature in his boyhood instead of the 
Bible, Plutarch's Lives, the biographies of 
great men like Washington and Franklin, 
^ sop's Fables, Robinson Crusoe and other 
inspirational and character-forming works? 

It is a calamity that so much of our modem 
literature should appeal to the morbid, the im- 
pure in human nature, instead of the pure, the 
good ; that writers should dwell upon the low- 
est rather than the highest elements in our na- 
ture. The constant suggestion of the good, 
the pure, the noble, the true, the awakening of 



130 The Crime of Silence 

the higher, the divine qualities in man, would 
revolutionize the mental attitude, the healthy 
and the morals of the race. 

If our dramatists would dwell less upon the 
abnormal and the vicious side of human na- 
ture ; if they would picture less of the bad and 
more of the good; if they would emphasize 
wickedness, immorality, vice, and the sins of 
humanity less, and goodness, morality, virtue, 
and the divine qualities more, the world would 
be the better for it. I believe one play like 
^^The Passing of the Third Floor Back," in 
which the mysterious ''Stranger" personifying 
the qualities of the divine Man, will ultimately 
do more good in elevating mankind than a 
thousand such plays as "The Easiest Way," 
notwithstanding the force of the latter's terri- 
ble picture of the fatal results of weakness and 
sin. 

The tendency is for what we see or read to 
live in the imagination. We do not stop to 
think that this is only the result of a play or the 
reading of a book; the reality of the story, 
whether portrayed on the stage, described in a 
book, or suggested in a picture is uppermost. 



Smuggling Poisoned Goods 131 

We are actually living for the time the story of 
heroism, crime, or whatever else it may be. 

What a splendid thing it would be to utilize 
this tremendous suggestive power in training 
children by putting in their hands only those 
books which will stir within them the ambition 
to become the noblest type of human beings it 
is possible to be. 

It is just as easy to build character with 
books, with good reading, as it is to tear it 
down. If the dime-novel type of story makes 
criminals by its criminal suggestions, the up- 
lifting, inspiring, encouraging books will have 
just the opposite effect. Many a boy has com- 
mitted crime while hypnotized by the vivid de- 
scription or suggestion of crime in a bad book. 
Many a man and woman has been spurred to a 
noble, unselfish act while under the influence 
of some inspiring life story. 

The suggestiveness of vice, of impurity in 
some of our literature is responsible for many 
blasted hopes and bhghted lives. The down- 
fall of many a ruined life began in the dry rot 
of a perverted imagination. Few of us ever 
realize how, by a subtle form of mental manu- 



132 The Crime of Silence 

f acture, repeated acts of the imagination weave 
themselves into a mighty tapestry, every figure 
and fancy of which will stand out in living 
colors in the character-web of our lives, to ap- 
prove or condemn us. The greatest power 
given us, to bless or ban, is the imagination, 
which, without self-control, would ruin a saint. 

As he thinketh in his heart, so is he. — ^Proverbs. 



CHAPTER VIII 

MOTHERS AND DAUGHTERS 

As pure as a pearl. 
And as perfect, — a noble and innocent girl. 

— Jean Ingelow. 

A DAY laborer in St. Paul's Road, London, 
recently found a six-hundred-and-fifty-thou- 
sand-dollar pearl necklace which had been lost, 
though supposedly stolen. After the work- 
man had turned the necklace over to the police 
he found one of the pearls which had become 
detached in his pocket. Being entirely igno- 
rant of its value, he tried to trade it in several 
public houses for a glass of beer, but the bar- 
maids, equally ignorant, thinking it an ordinary 
bead or marble, would not take it. This pearl 
which the man could not exchange for a glass 
of beer proved to be worth twenty-five thou- 
sand dollars. 

How many young women have ignorantly 
bartered their priceless pearl of virtue for a 

133 



134 The Crime of Silence 

bauble, traded it for a few luxuries, pretty 
clothes, jewelry, or an evening's entertainment 
or excitement, without really knowing what 
they were doing, with little more knowledge of 
the real value of the pearl of great price which 
they had exchanged for a bauble than this poor 
London laborer had of the value of the pearl 
he tried to exchange for a drink ! How many 
beautiful girls who seek questionable associates 
and who think they are seeing life and getting 
away from what they regard as puritanical 
home rule, away from hated chaperonage, real- 
ize the preciousness of that which they may be 
thoughtlessly flinging away for a little excite- 
ment, a little false pleasure ! They do not un- 
derstand that a single indiscretion may ruin 
their whole future. Their mothers have never 
explained to them the terrible risks they run 
of losing that which, once lost, no wealth or po- 
sition can ever restore. They have never told 
them that no fortune, however large, can com- 
pensate for the loss of their pearl of great 
price. 

If girls, when they begin to go out from the 
home, were properly armed and safeguarded 
with a scientific knowledge of themselves; if 



Mothers and Daughters 135 

they were informed of the marvelous precious- 
ness of the jewel of virtue, which holds sacred 
the power entrusted to them by their Creator 
for the purpose of the miracle of reproduction, 
the wonder of motherhood, it would be an al- 
most unheard of thing that any girl should sell 
herself cheaply, or thoughtlessly. If girls 
were reared with the idea that life itself is cheap 
in comparison with their virtue, not one normal 
girl in a million would part with that precious 
gift for any price. 

The average girl has been brought up in the 
belief that there are certain questions, certain 
things in her life, about which she is not sup- 
posed to know anything. No matter how 
much she may be troubled or perplexed by 
those things, by the vague yearnings of her 
nature, bj^ emotions which she can not under- 
stand, yet even her mother is not sufficiently 
close to her to talk about these matters or to 
give her any instruction or information what- 
ever regarding them. Social conventions, tra- 
ditions centuries old, have hitherto commanded 
silence upon the most important facts of life. 

Yet, as a matter of fact, the best possible in- 
surance of a girl's virtue and the protection of 



136 The Crime of Silence 

her character, is in knowing the whole truth 
about her body. Such knowledge, far from 
detracting from a girl's innocence strengthens 
it to remain firm against vicious assaults. 

I know a mother in Washington, the wife of 
a man of national reputation, who had a most 
charming daughter, a girl of superb physical 
and mental endowment. Her great beauty 
and intellectual brilliancy attracted many ad- 
mirers. The mother, like so many mothers of 
past generations, did not realize the dangers 
that confront young girls who are reared in 
utter ignorance of their sex nature, and never 
talked with her daughter on this vital question. 
She herself had been reared with the idea that 
it is a subject which girls should never think of, 
much less discuss. She was an easy and indul- 
gent mother, too, and her daughter, as she ap- 
proached womanhood, became spoiled by the 
attentions of men who had flattered her beauty 
and brilliancy. Self-willed and headstrong, 
she drifted absolutely beyond her mother's con- 
trol. Finally the girl went on the stage, where 
she was especially exposed to temptations. 

Being utterly ignorant of her sex nature and 
the dangers and pitfalls that surrounded her, 



Mothers and Daughters 137 

the girl very soon fell a victim to unprincipled 
men, who hunted her as hounds hunt deer. 
She got in with a fast set of people, learned 
to smoke cigarettes and drink cocktails, and 
in a short time formed other vicious habits. 
Though a brilliant actress, she ultimately lost 
her grip upon her popularity on the stage and 
deteriorated so frightfully that she passed away 
in an inebriate and drug asylum, a victim of the 
cruel conspiracy of silence upon the sex ques- 
tion. If her mother had given her proper in- 
struction regarding her sex nature, and had 
early taught her self-restraint, this wonderful 
girl, with her magnificent possibilities, might 
have been saved from a life of disgrace. As 
it was, she was WTccked in the very bloom of 
young womanhood; breaking her mother's 
heart and nearly ruining her father's career. 
I have often heard mothers say that they did 
not want their daughters to know that any such 
thing as inunorality existed, that they wanted 
to bring them up pure and innocent. It is 
true there is something indescribably beautiful 
in the innocence, the sprightliness, the ingenu- 
ousness, the playful spontaneity of perfectly 
pure, untainted girlhood. But, my good 



138 The Crime of Silence 

mother friend, have you ever thought that, 
while you are trying to shield your daughter 
from knowledge of herself and the evil of the 
world, she may be getting information from the 
most vicious sources, distorted, exaggerated 
pictures that may lead to her ruin? Isn't it 
better that this knowledge, which she must 
sooner or later have, should come from you, 
who can give her the truth, rather than from 
illegitimate sources which garble and distort 
facts in a way that will inflame and debauch 
her imagination? Why not tell her the plain, 
scientific truth about herself and about her 
future, what part she is to play in the perpetua- 
tion of the race ? It is not scientific facts which 
demoralize the mind; it is distorted, obscene 
suggestions that arouse curiosity and inflame 
passions. The facts will not hurt your daugh- 
ter, but will protect her against a thousand 
evils. 

Owing to the great ignorance of our girls 
regarding their own natures and the peculiar 
meaning of their sex they are easily led astray, 
when proper training and loiowledge in regard 
to these subjects would defend and shield them. 
More girls go wrong from ignorance of them- 



Mothers and Daughters 139 

selves and of the terrible results of sexual sin 
than from almost anything else, and parents 
are responsible for this colossal ignorance. In- 
stead of our little girls living the simple life, 
which is the only normal life, allowing their 
natures to develop naturally, they live, at least 
in our cities, a complex, stimulative life, the 
very nature of which tends to make them pre- 
maturely old. Even before they reach their 
teens, too, they are teased about their ''beaux"; 
— this at an age when the slightest lightly- 
spoken sex suggestion should be tabooed. 
Everything which tends to over-stimulate sex- 
ual instinct should be kept away from them, 
especially during the most dangerous earlier 
years, when the seeds of ruin are sown in the 
great majority of girls who go wrong. 

Mothers should have frequent heart-to-heart 
talks with their daughters during their perilous 
years of adolescence, when rapid changes are 
taking place in their nature. This is the ro- 
mantic age when the emotions are awakening, 
and young people, perplexed by the new sen- 
sations, are tempted to do all sorts of foolish 
things. It is the stage at which mothers 
should be most watchful of their daughters. 



140 The Crime of Silence 

They should tell them how multitudes of girls 
have been humiliated all their lives, or abso- 
lutely ruined, by giving way to foolish impulses 
when romance was busy weaving her enticing 
pictures in the imagination. 

It is during this impressionable period that 
young people are most strongly tempted and 
have an almost uncontrollable desire to see what 
forbidden things are like. When they get 
away from the restraints of home they want to 
see and know hidden things for themselves, 
to get unusual experiences, to feel the thrill 
of new sensations. They crave excitement. 
Their pent-up energies and emotions often so 
unbalance their minds that they innocently and 
ignorantly do things which nothing would 
tempt them to do if they really understood or 
appreciated their gravity. During this per- 
ilous, romantic period the sexual instinct devel- 
ops more rapidly than the judgment, so that 
the mind of the growing girl is not always nor- 
mal. She has not the same perspective as older 
people, and hence is much more easily influ- 
enced and led astray. 

Only a short time ago I read of a girl who 
went to a dance hall with a friend ''just to see 



Mothers and Daughters 141 

what it was like/' She met one whom she 
afterwards described as "an awfully nice man," 
who was very kind, who treated her to ice 
cream, and asked if he might call on her. The 
result was that she did meet him again, and, be- 
fore long, believing herself to be in love, she 
gave up her position and eloped with the ''nice 
young man" who proved to be a white slaver. 
This was the end of the girl who had never 
known wrong until she went with a girl friend 
to a dance hall for a few minutes, "just to see 
what it was like." 

Every girl should be so thoroughly posted 
upon the mystery of sex and what sex relations 
mean as to realize that a single slip, a single 
indiscretion at this period may cost her that 
which is more precious than her own life. It 
is ignorance rather than inclination that ruins 
most girls who go astray. They instinctively 
want to do right. They love cleanliness and 
purity much more than men do, but the vicious 
take advantage of their ignorance and play 
upon their finer sensibilities, their greater sym- 
pathy and their longings for love and admira- 
tion. How man)^ young girls are ruined just 
because of their innocence and ignorance which 



142 The Crime of Silence 

really constitute their greatest attraction for 
the libertine ! 

During those most beautiful years in girl- 
hood, when childhood is receding and woman- 
hood advancing, when the maiden, — 

standing with reluctant feet 
Where the brook and river meet, — 

peers with a mixture of longing and shrinking 
into the mysterious, unknown future, she needs 
most of all the care of a wise, loving mother. 
During those years the romantic faculties 
and the imagination are especially active, and, 
not having yet developed the judgment and 
wisdom which come from experience, girls at 
this period, if not properly instructed, are in 
great danger of doing all sorts of silly things. 
They have a great love of adventure; all of 
their instincts are clamorous and insistent, es- 
pecially the sexual instinct which imperiously 
demands explanation. The result of these far- 
reaching physiological changes is often the de- 
velopment of qualities which the mothers can- 
not understand. These are the years in which 
girls should be very close to their mothers; 
when they need the guidance of wisdom and 



Mothers and Daughters 143 

level heads, without the bad results of constant 
suppression and over-chaperonage. In other 
words, at this time girls need liberty, not 
license, tempered, restrained, ^nd safeguarded* 
by wise love, for it is during this romantic 
phase of it that their life is set, that the trend 
of character which largely decides the girl's 
future is determined. 

It is fatally easy during this transition 
period to slide into the meshes of entangle- 
ments which mar the character and which often 
cripple, if not ruin, the whole life. This is 
the time when many girls are unconsciously led 
into entanglements with men of whom they 
know practically nothing, which compromise 
their reputation and seriously injure them, 
even when they are perfectly innocent of any 
wrong, but have only been indiscreet. 

How many mothers have been broken- 
hearted over the sexual wrecking of daughters 
who might have been saved by proper instruc- 
tion! How many daughters commit suicide 
every year because of the sin against which 
their mothers never even cautioned them dur- 
ing their adolescence or before the age of 
puberty ! 



144 The Crime of Silence 

How little mothers who have been silent on 
the sex question realize that perhaps a few 
heart-to-heart talks with their daughters, en- 
lightening them upon the subject, would pre- 
vent them from making shipwreck of their 
lives ! 

Only the exceptional girl could ever be in- 
duced to commit a sin against her own body if 
she were properly instructed, if she realized 
that she was bartering the very jewel of her 
soul for a mess of pottage. 

It is estimated that only five per cent, of 
those who go wrong know what they are doing. 
The ninety-five are girls who never heard of 
such a fact as sex relations. 

You mothers must know, if you stop to think, 
that the great majority of girls do not talk 
much about their chance male acquaintances. 
Even now your own daughter, whom you think 
so innocent, may have met some man of whom 
you know nothing, and whose acquaintance 
may prove dangerous to her. You cannot be 
always with her, and every time she goes out on 
the street she is liable to meet men who have 
no compunction at leading young girls astray. 
Only the other day I heard of a man of wealth 



Mothers and Daughters 145 

and good social standing who offered a girl of 
seventeen the protection of his umbrella in a 
rain storm, and from that led her on to her 
ruin. 

Men of this sort play upon a girl's vanity 
and her instinctive love of pretty things, fine 
clothes, and tasteful surroundings, to win her 
confidence and affection. Then there is a 
promise of marriage, and then, — well, the story 
is an old one, and we all know how it ends. 

The majority of girls who go wrong in this 
way are easy-going and pleasure-loving. 
They have not been brought up to develop 
force of resistance; they have not been taught 
the protecting power of a vigorous "No.'' An 
untrained, weak nature is a fatally poor equip- 
ment for fighting the battle of life and the in- 
sidious, hypnotizing enemies of virtue. A 
trained will and the power of self-mastery 
would save thousands of girls from untold suf- 
fering and ruin. 

A love of finery, a passion for clothes, is as- 
suredly no excuse for an easy hold on virtue. 
Neither does it excuse those mothers who have 
never taught their daughters that their unsul- 
lied purity is the very basis of all that is noble 



146 The Crime of Silence 

and worth while in life, who have never cau- 
tioned them against the evil that may be 
wrought by their love of pretty things, their 
desire to live in ease and luxury which they 
have not earned. 

One of the most difficult things in the world 
for a mother is to see anything wrong in her 
own child. She is blind to its faults, and often, 
after the worm of impurity has already eaten 
its way into her girl's heart and is blighting her 
life, the mother does not see it. 

I have never known a mother whose daugh- 
ter went wrong who did not say that she never 
doubted her child was all right, never dreamed 
that harm would come to her. There are 
many things that girls do not tell their mothers, 
and it is a strange thing that this is especially 
true in matters of the sexes, their flirtations, 
their loves, their romantic experiences. In 
multitudes of cases their mother is the last per- 
son they would ever think of making their con- 
fidant, possibly for fear of repression, or in- 
creased chaperonage, the cutting off of their 
liberties, or because few girls are ever close 
enough to their mothers to talk over such things 
with them. 



Mothers and Daughters 147 

Few girls ever reveal their unfortunate ex- 
periences with men, even to their mothers. 
The very nature of the sexual relation tends 
to secrecy, even with one's best friend. This 
is notably true when a girl is conscious of hav- 
ing done wrong or been guilty of the least 
indiscretion. It is all the more imperative, 
then, that a mother should be so close to her 
daughters that they will keep nothing from her, 
that they will reveal their inmost secrets to her. 

It is often difficult for a mother to tell what 
is going on in her daughter's heart, no matter 
how devoted each may be to the other. But 
every mother ought to be able to tell something 
about it from her own experience. She must 
know how hard, probably impossible, it was 
for her to tell her mother about some of 
her love affairs. No girl whispers her love 
secrets into her mother's ears simply because 
she is her mother, unless she has been trained 
from childhood to make a confidant of her. 

Every mother, however, no matter how ig- 
norant or how badly trained herself, has had 
experiences and knows many things, knowl- 
edge of which would be of untold advantage 
to her daughter. Why does she hesitate to tell 



148 The Crime or Silence 

her? Why hide from her knowledge that may 
shield her from great evil before marriage, and 
probably from great suffering even after mar- 
riage? 

A well-known woman writer, discussing this 
subject, says that one would think that many 
mothers go on the principle that falling in love 
and getting married are merely accidents, like 
being struck by lightning, which is so unlikely 
to happen to their own daughters that it isn't 
worth while to prepare for it. 

It is too true that the average mother treats 
her daughter as if she never expected her to 
marry ; for the girl comes clear up to the altar 
practically in utter ignorance of what is before 
her, without one single valuable lesson from 
her mother about herself and what marriage 
means. She has simply followed a blind in- 
stinct which has bidden her to mate. She 
thinks of married life as a continuation of her 
courtship, a blissful experience with a congen- 
ial, worshipping companion. She is utterly 
unprepared for the rude shattering of her 
maiden dreams which so often follows mar- 
riage for the romantic, uninstructed girl. 

It is criminal to allow a girl to go through 



Mothers and Daughters 149 

the nuptial ceremony without any idea of the 
real significance of the step she is taking. She 
should be as thoroughly prepared for marriage 
and all that awaits her afterwards as she 
would be prepared for her entrance to college 
or for a professional career. There is no other 
step a human being ever takes so important 
as marriage, yet there is no other for which 
less preparation is made. How many mothers 
bitterly blame themselves afterwards for the 
untold suffering such lack of preparation 
brings to their daughters. They know very 
well that they might have prevented the wreck- 
age of innocent young lives. They are power- 
less to repair the evil results of their false mod- 
esty, their prudish ideas of preserving what 
they called the sweet, beautiful innocence of 
their daughters. 



CHAPTER IX 

PERILOUS ''pleasures" 

Man is first startled by sin; then it becomes pleasing, then 
easy, then delightful, then frequent, then habitual, then con- 
firmed. — Jeremy Taylor. 

There is no vice so simple but assumes 
Some mark of virtue on his outward parts. 

— Shakespeare. 

In Kipling's fable of ''Barrenness/' the 
slave of vice is asked to surrender, one after 
another, his trust in man, his faith in woman, 
and the hopes and conscience of his childhood. 
In exchange for all these, the demon leaves him 
a crust of dry bread ! 

When a man seeks questionable pleasure, he 
should always try to think of what he must 
pay for it, of his condition after he shall have 
eaten the forbidden fruit, of what he will have 
lost, and of what will have gone out of him, 
for he will never be quite the same again. 

If we could project ourselves into "the mo- 
ment after," how many follies we should not 

150 



Perilous ''Pleasures'' 151 

commit! If we had enough imagination, we 
would do our repenting before instead of after 
the evil deed. 

There is no other human experience so dis- 
appointing to the great promise it makes as ex- 
perience in vicious pleasure. There is a fas- 
cination in regard to it, a morbid curiosity 
about it which often lures one on in quest of 
the forbidden, the unlawful, to ''see what it is 
like," but the quest invariably ends in bitter 
disappointment. There is a fleeting exhilara- 
tion in the draining of the cup of false pleas- 
ure, but there are bitter dregs at the bottom; 
the poison of the serpent, which afterward 
stings and torments the victim, is concealed in 
every wrong act, however alluring in its prom- 
ise. 

No one has ever been able to explain the 
philosophy of the fascination of evil, the call 
of the wrong, the lure of sin. It is an opiate 
to those who are susceptible. They are fas- 
cinated by the evil, when they know it injures 
them, much as a bird is fascinated and drawn 
to it by a snake, even though it knows the rep- 
tile is its deadly enemy. 

This pull of sin, this lure of wrongdoing 



152 The Crime of Silence 

seems to deaden the sensibilities, to paralyze 
the will. Its effect on those who yield to it is 
similar to that of opium on victims of the drug 
habit. They know perfectly well that it is 
their enemy, that it demoralizes their faculties, 
deteriorates their brain power, saps their vital- 
ity, and will kill all that is finest and noblest 
in them, and yet the fascination of it pulls 
them on. 

Right here in its hypnotic, mesmeric pull 
comes the danger of wrongdoing. It is in its 
power to soothe the moral sense, to deaden the 
conscience that it gets its strongest hold on its 
victims. It acts like an anesthetic, an opiate 
to the moral sensibilities, so that the wrong at 
the time does not seem so very wrong ; and the 
wrongdoer does not really grasp the full mean- 
ing of his act, or appreciate the vicious influ- 
ences of the evil spell that holds, that enchains 
him. 

We all know something of the terrible suf- 
fering of those who are habitually lured by evil, 
when they have come out from under its mes- 
meric spell. The shock of returning to their 
senses after they have recovered from the effect 
of the vicious anesthetic sometimes unbalances 



Perilous ''Pleasures'' 153 

the mind. They endure agonies from the hu- 
mihating consciousness of wounded self-re- 
spect ; they despise themselves for wallowing in 
moral filth. The reaction is sometimes so 
great, so terrible, that people commit suicide. 

I have seen a habitual drunkard, after a 
week's debauch, during which he plunged into 
all sorts of excesses,, come out of his sinful orgy 
a total wreck. The awful lure of drink drew 
him to take into his mouth the enemy which he 
knew would steal away his brain, his good 
sense, his judgment, his self-respect, and 
would leave him an easy prey to every other 
form of evil. Yet the temptation to sin, once 
yielded to, pulled the victim irrevocably into 
its toils. 

Some people, when tempted to do bad 
things, think they can silence the still small 
voice within by resorting to drink or drugs. 
They imagine that by drowning the accusing 
voice they can better enjoy the debauch, but 
they pay the price afterwards. There is no 
escaping the penalty of wrongdoing. Many 
a man despises himself, perhaps for years, for 
some violation of virtue, or some wicked de- 
bauch indulged in when his better nature was 



154 The Crime of Silence 

lulled into quiescence by some deadening an- 
esthetic of temptation. 

Thus one of the most subtle and dangerous 
things about sin is its inherent, fatal tendency 
to soothe, its soporific influence, which para- 
lyzes the will power and leaves the victim help- 
less. There is a sort of lure, or glamour, about 
certain forms of wrongdoing, which hypno- 
tize a man so that he is not quite himself. He 
can not act with his usual force of choice. 
There is a subtle mesmeric influence at work 
in his brain which dazes him and gives him a 
sense of intoxication, and he is for the moment 
the victim of one of the strongest impulses, 
that of his animal nature. 

Perverted sexual instinct above all others, 
affects the judgment and makes the victims 
blind to their own welfare. Sexual sinners, 
under the spell of their infatuation, can not 
see the awful, the degrading consequences of 
their wrongdoing. On awakening, however, 
the sense of the guilt which comes from the 
consciousness of sexual taint hangs over the 
mind like a pall. 

No one ever indulges in sensuality who does 
not despise himself afterward when the God 



Perilous ''Pleasures" 155 

image reasserts itself and shames the wrong- 
doer. I have heard a young man say, after a 
sensual debauch, that the tortures he suffered 
were a thousand times greater than the mo- 
mentary pleasure gained by the gratification 
of his animal instincts. 

No happiness worth the name is possible 
when procured by the violation of any sacred 
law of our nature. There can be no real or 
lasting pleasure in an evil deed, because it 
shocks the divinity within us which always ap- 
plauds the right and condemns the wrong. 
This is perfectly natural, because, being God's 
children, we have inherited His qualities. His 
instinctive hatred of all sin. It is the God 
nature m us that suffers every time we do 
wrong; it is the sense of outraging the God 
image in us, our ideal of manhood or woman- 
hood, that puts a sting in the vice that we 
thought would be pleasure. This sense of out- 
raging our own conscience, this insult to the 
divine within us, turns the fleeting pleasure 
into lasting pain. 

One has only to look at the sad, unhappy, 
sin-stained faces of the women of the street, 
to listen to their hollow, mocking laughter. 



156 The Crime of Silence 

more pitiful than tears, to get a powerful ob- 
ject lesson in the disappointment, the awful 
disillusion of vice. There is no possibility of 
extracting happiness from it. All there is in it 
is a little temporary excitement, a nervous ex- 
hilaration, the foam at the top of the glass 
which hides the deadly poison at the bottom. 

Hypnotize ourselves as we may, we can not 
hide the truth that enduring happiness can 
only come from doing right. The moment 
there is self-accusation, self-condemnation, a 
wounded self-respect, the fancied pleasure is 
gone, the after pain has more than neutralized 
it. The rebuke of the conscience for the 
wrongdoing infinitely more than balances any 
little measure of false pleasure that comes 
while the brain is intoxicated, the senses hypno- 
tized by passion. People who violate the laws 
of their higher nature sooner or later pay an 
awful price for it. 

A noted burglar tells what a fearful fascina- 
tion there is in planning how to enter a house 
and to get away all the valuables he can secure 
without being shot. The very daring of it, he 
says, seems to draw a curtain over the crime 
and to blind him to its terrible consequences. 



Perilous ''Pleasures" 157 

If it were not for this misleading, deceptive 
lure of all forms of vice, it would lose its fas- 
cination. If vice only carried with its alluring 
picture the opposite picture of its fatal destroy- 
ing power, there would be no such thing as 
vice. 

The tempters, the purveyors of evil, the 
seducers of youth try to increase the lure of sin. 
They use all their arts to make it attractive. 

The new devil of the twentieth century is not 
like the old. He has lost his horns, has ex- 
changed his traditional satanic dress for up-to- 
date modern attire. He has put off his repul- 
sive appearance and become fascinating and 
attractive. He is exceedingly magnetic. He 
does not frighten or drive away his customers 
by his appearance; he allures, he draws them 
by every seduction he can command. He has 
adopted the latest psychological business meth- 
ods. He does not attempt to force his victims. 
He merely suggests, insinuates, lures. He 
keeps his hoofs out of sight. His tail is cov- 
ered by a dress coat. 

The Bible tells us that the devil cast out of 
the swine said his name was ''Legion." This is 
certainly the name of the modern devil. His 



158 The Crime or Silence 

name and his forms are legion. He hides un- 
der innumerable subtle temptations. The pit- 
falls he digs for his victims are often covered 
with flowers. Ruin and death are cunningly 
hidden under the guise of pleasure. 

The wrong road is made very alluring to a 
youth. He hears entrancing music which 
dazes his senses ; the god of pleasure puts him, 
as it were, under a magic spell, and he stands 
bewildered, intoxicated by the allurements 
which beckon him. The broad, joyous road 
to death looks far more attractive, far more 
fascinating than the straight and narrow path 
of wisdom; and, if he has not been properly 
trained, if he has not been warned of the pit- 
falls in the way, if he has not learned how to 
control his passions, he is likely to take the 
wrong road. 

Most of the glittering temptations which be- 
set youth and older people, too, come after 
dark. It is a strange fact that whatever is 
wrong, whatever is demoralizing, can not bear 
the light. Sunlight is an enemy of vice. 
Darkness, seclusion, mystery, — these are its 
accompaniments. Comparatively little of the 
sinning of the world takes place in the sunlight. 



Perilous ''Pleasures" 159 

Somehow, when God's sunlight shines full in 
the face of a man, it makes him ashamed of vio- 
lating the sacredness of his nature, of defiling 
the divine within him. 

Our idea of a personal devil is that he is al- 
ways working in the dark, that the light is 
poison to him, that he can not carry on his 
Satanic operations in the sunshine. The coun- 
terfeiter, the burglar, the murderer, the se- 
ducer, the man who leads innocence astray, 
and all his other emissaries do their base work 
in the dark, out of sight. Crime lurks in the 
byways, the alleys, the dark places, the unob- 
served entrances. It shrinks from the open 
gaze of day. The blessed sunlight is an enemy 
of weakness, an enemy of sin. 

If a fraction of the frightful expense caused 
by crime in every large city were expended in 
lighting up all the dark, dismal places, es- 
pecially the slums, making the streets, the alley- 
ways and byways as nearly like the daylight 
as possible, it would diminish crime immensely 
and would prove a tremendous investment for 
the city. 

When men are about to do wrong they want 
to get out of the light into the dark street, 



160 The Crime of Silence 

away from the public gaze, away from the ob- 
servation of their fellowmen. When a man 
goes to indulge his criminal passions, he wants 
to get away from observation. He would be 
very low who would dare openly, and before 
those who know him, whose good opinion he 
craves, go into the haunts of vice. If men 
were obliged to come out into the open, into 
the light, with their nefarious deeds, if they 
were obliged to do them before the eyes of their 
fellowmen, they would never do them, they 
could not be induced to. 

If we could throw wide the doors which hide 
vice in a great city ; if we could open the win- 
dows and let in the sunshine ; if we could draw 
aside the curtains from the opium dens and all 
the other resorts of sin ; if we could turn on the 
light, take away the mystery, the secrecy 
which surrounds it, vice would largely disap- 
pear from the face of the earth. 

Before men who make claims to respectabil- 
ity go into these vicious places, they look up 
and down the street to see if by any possibility 
there is any one in sight who knows them; 
then they sneak in and sneak out again, 
ashamed, disgusted with themselves, their self- 



Perilous ''Pleasures" 161 

respect wounded. They hate themselves for 
their debauchery, despise themselves because 
they have been something less than men, be- 
cause they have allowed the brute in them to 
silence that still, small voice of manhood, 
which always calls for the manly thing. I 
have known groups of college boys to go to a 
city at night and indulge in drunken, vulgar 
debauches, and then loathe themselves for it 
months afterwards. 

Beware of the pleasure that looks different 
in the morning, that makes you despise your- 
self when the daylight comes; the pleasure 
which has a reaction, which makes you feel that 
there is something sacred gone out of you after 
you have tasted it, which makes you think a 
little less of yourself, even if you do not ac- 
tually hate yourself for it. 

Yes, darkness seemingly tends to bring out 
the evil in human beings. The brute side, the 
Edward Hyde side of Dr. Jekyll in every 
character, is a night prowler. When he sleeps 
at all it is in the daytime like the owl and some 
of the wild beasts; he doesn't like the light. 
Most of his damage is done in the night- 
time. 



162 The Crime of Silence 

The majority of people who go wrong are 
ruined after dinner or supper, when they are 
through with their day's work. This is the 
time when the Satan in us, the propensity to 
evil, the temptation to do all sorts of forbid- 
den things, is especially strong and active, and 
our power of resistance correspondingly less. 

One reason for this is that during the day- 
time most of us are busy with our work, which 
is our best friend. It is our great protector, 
which shields us from a multitude of tempta- 
tions that appeal to the unoccupied mind, to 
people out of work, or to those who are habitu- 
ally idle. A man or woman who is kept busy 
in making a living, in useful work has fewer 
temptations to do wrong than the one who is 
merely seeking amusement. The human mind 
was made for action; and, when it is not use- 
fully employed, like a piece of unused machin- 
ery, it deteriorates very rapidly. In a very 
literal sense, one's task, be it even drudgery, is 
his life preserver. 

Young unmarried men are peculiarly ex- 
posed to danger at night. A married man 
loves his home, and so has less temptation to 
wander about after his day's work is done. 



Perilous ''Pleasures" 163 

His family is his balance wheel, the great 
steadier of his character. But the young un- 
married man, having no home ties and no re- 
sponsibilities, unless he is thoroughly trained in 
self-mastery and loves his books and is always 
improving himself, often succumbs to the flar- 
ing and dangerous amusements, the many al- 
luring temptations of the night, especially in 
our large centres of population. 

The whole influence of our modern city life 
is calculated to over-stimulate the lower nature ; 
and, unfortunately, the city offers all sorts 
of opportunities for secret indulgences in vice. 
This makes cities much more dangerous for the 
young than the country and the smaller towns. 
No one knows and no one cares what a lone boy 
or girl in a great city does, and the worst fea- 
ture of the dangerous fascinations of all the 
city's lures from vile sources is that their appeal 
is strongest, their power to tempt greatest just 
at the time when young people are struggling 
with an inner passion, which utterly bewilders 
and surprises them, especially if they have had 
no safeguard of knowledge thrown up to pro- 
tect them. 

It is the first step that counts, whether on the 



164 The Crime of Silence 

up or on the down grade. Job tells us that 
"man is born to evil as the sparks fly upward," 
and it certainly seems to be the great trouble 
with many of us that we are more inclined to 
take the downward than the upward step ; that, 
instead of obeying the call of the higher man 
and ascending to the heights where purity and 
blessedness dwell, we are but too ready to hsten 
to the call of the beast and go down to the 
depths. And oh, it is so fatally easy to yield 
to the wrong after the first false step ! After 
the first sin it becomes easier and easier to do 
wrong, until the habit is formed and the pro- 
test within becomes fainter and fainter, less 
and less insistent, until gradually self-respect 
dies out and the downward course is acceler- 
ated. 

Thousands of women have regretted all 
their lives the drinking of their first cocktail, 
or allowing the first kiss, the first embrace, or 
other familiarity of their male companions. 
Tens of thousands of men have taken their first 
step to ruin and utter degradation by yielding 
to the temptation of their first convivial glass 
with ''the boys," or to that of entering some 
den of vice ''just to see what it was like." 



Perilous ''Pleasures'' 165 

When men are doubtful of the true state of things, their 
wishes lead them to believe in what is most agreeable. 

— Arriantjs. 

What ! know ye not the gains of crime 

Are dust and dross; 
Its ventures on the waves of time 

Foredoomed to loss? — J. G. Whittier. 



CHAPTER X 

FATHERS AND SONS 
Knowledge is power. 

Diogenes struck the father when the son swore. 

— Robert Burton. 

It is a wise father that knows his own child. 

— Shakespeare. 

"I HAYE noticed/' said the late William Ac- 
ton, M.R.C.S., ''that all patients who have con- 
fessed to me that they have practiced vice la- 
mented that they were not, when children, 
made aware of its consequences; and I have 
been pressed over and over again to urge on 
parents, guardians, schoolmasters, and others 
interested in the education of youth, the neces- 
sity of giving their charges some warning, some 
intimation of their danger. To parents and 
guardians I offer my earnest advice that they 
should, by hearty sympathy and frank explana- 
tion, aid their charges in maintaining pure 
lives." 

Ignorance is the cause of much of the crimi- 

166 



Fathers and Sons 167 

nal perversion of the noblest of human instincts. 
We have been emphasizing in educational mat- 
ters the fact that ''knowledge is power." Now 
we are beginning to find that knowledge, pure, 
sane and scientific knowledge in sex matters, 
is a youth's greatest protection against evil. 
Many human wrecks have been ruined through 
ignorance. 

What would you think of a father who 
would build a ship for his son, teach him every 
detail about its construction, and equip it com- 
pletely, but who would fail to put a compass 
on board to tell his son anything about navi- 
gation, and would then start him out across an 
unknown ocean? What would be the chances 
of the boy's reaching port in safety? Yet 
many a father thus sets his son adrift, without 
moral compass or rudder, upon the high seas 
of life ! He sends him into the midst of temp- 
tations and dangers, without a word of advice 
or guidance in regard to the perils that may 
assail him from within and without, without 
teaching him anything of the meaning, the use, 
or the abuse of a passion which he feels develop- 
ing within him, but of whose mysterious nature 
he is totally ignorant! 



168 The Crime of Silence 

It is a strange thing that men who have 
nearly been wrecked on the sex rocks them- 
selves, knowing the frightful risks and the 
perils in the path of youth, do not warn their 
sons. Every father knows the ordeal his boy 
will have to pass through during the early 
years of his life, and his silence in regard to it 
is cruel^ criminal. 

There is no other way in which you can ren- 
der your son such valuable service as to instil 
into his heart the idea of the terrible havoc 
which uncontrolled, abused, or misused sexual 
instinct will bring to him. To be forearmed, 
protected by scientific knowledge of the dan- 
gers of uncontrolled sexual instincts, is as 
necessary for a youth as to be provided with a 
chart showing the position of the rocks and 
reefs, the dangerous eddies and currents in his 
course is for a navigator. It is a terrible thing 
to allow your son to run the danger of being 
morally wrecked, to take such risks, not only 
with his health, happiness, and success, but also 
with the health, happiness, and success of those 
who come after him, just because you do not 
like to speak of such a delicate matter or do 



Fathers and Sons 169 

not quite know how to do it. He will think 
that you are ashamed to speak to him about a 
function which the Creator did not think it be- 
neath him to create in such a marvelous man- 
ner. He will probably think that you yourself 
have done something to be ashamed of, and 
that you can not bear to speak of the matter 
to him. 

The majority of fathers seem to think that 
everything connected with the moral and spir- 
itual training of their boys is none of their busi- 
ness, but that all that must be attended to by 
the mothers. But there is a period in youth 
when the father is better fitted even than the 
mother to instruct his boy in sex matters. He 
knows even better than she does the tempta- 
tions to which a growing youth will be exposed 
from within and without. He can warn him 
against pitfalls of which she, perhaps, may be 
ignorant. He can better understand the na- 
ture and development of his unfolding pas- 
sions. 

There is no other period in the life of a 
youth so beautiful, so interesting, so sacred, 
as the critical period approaching puberty. 



170 The Crime of Silence 

During these short years his whole character is 
usually determined, — ^his physical vigor^ his 
manner, his voice, his mental powers. 

Sexual abuse or forbidden indulgences dur- 
ing this stage so sap the vitality as to dwarf and 
blight both physical and mental development. 
A perverted imagination at this age has a 
frightful effect upon the entire nature. The 
symptoms of such a condition can often be no- 
ticed in the gi'adual change in the youth's man- 
ner and disposition. He avoids the society of 
others. He keeps by himself. He blushes 
and stammers in the presence of strangers. 
He shrinks from his former close communion 
with his mother or even his father. He does 
not enjoy being questioned about himself. He 
does not like to face people or look them in the 
eye. 

In the average boy the sexual instinct is 
probably at its height from fifteen to seventeen 
years of age, and the sexual desires are then 
most insistent. This is the time of gravest 
peril in his career; and, if proper information 
on the subject is given before the desires are 
fully developed or indulged in, the boy will be 
in an infinitely safer position than if left in ig- 



Fathers and Sons 171 

norance because he will know what it all means, 
and will be better prepared to meet tempta- 
tion. 

If you can guard your son against the misuse 
of the sexual instinct and keep him from self- 
defilement up to seventeen years of age ; if you 
have fortified his mind with healthy informa- 
tion upon the subject, he will be comparatively 
safe thereafter. 

Now, it is a splendid thing when your boy is 
approaching puberty to ask him frequently if 
anything is troubling, or puzzling him; if he 
has any problem with which you can help him. 

Every boy is going to have a confidant, some 
one to whom he can tell his secrets, to whom he 
can whisper his hopes and ambitions which he 
would not breathe to others. We take it for 
granted that his mother will stand nearer to 
him than any other person ; but every boy will 
have some male friend who will stand in a 
peculiar relation to him, one which even his 
mother cannot fill. This friend, this confidant, 
should be his father. 

The discovery has recently been made that 
the marvelous modification of a boy's physique 
and mind before puberty is due to the action of 



172 The Crime or Silence 

the sex fluid which normallj^, is absorbed into 
the blood and other secretions, where it per- 
forms its miracle of transformation into mas- 
culinity and virility, but which if abused, 
wasted or lost, causes a corresponding loss in 
the youth, makes him so much less a man and so 
inuch more a woman. ^ ^^ '^ ^- ' • ^ ' '^ Cksv^ ^ wv*w4 

How easy it would be for a father to show his 
boy that his sexual organs were set aside for a 
divine purpose and that any abuse of them will 
mar his whole life and possibly ruin his career, 
to say nothing of the tremendous suffering and 
danger which come from the horrible dis- 
eases that often follow abuse of the sexual in- 
stinct. 

If you begin early enough, it is compara- 
tively easy for you to gain your boy's confi- 
dence, so that he will instinctively come to you 
with anything that troubles or perplexes him 
in regard to sexual matters. From infancy, 
he should grow up to feel that no one can take 
your place; that you stand in a peculiar rela- 
tion to him, which no one else can fill. 

A boy's temperament and disposition have a 
great bearing upon his sexual development and 
excitability. A very emotional and precocious 



J 



Fathers and Sons 173 

boy, even though he be quiet and sedate and 
his parents may think that his mind has never 
been tainted, may be suffering untold ag- 
onies from habits which he has formed, prob- 
ably, because he knew nothing whatever of 
their baneful effects. 

Many a boy suffering thus has longed to 
have his father ask him a straight question 
about himself, because this would give him an 
opportunity to open his heart on the subject. 
Young men have told me that when boys they 
often took long walks with their father and 
took pains to be with him at every opportunity, 
longing, hoping against hope, that he would 
broach the matter which was troubling them, — 
but never a word came on that subject. 

No matter how innocent a boy may be, if he 
has reached the age of puberty, it is infinitely 
safer for you, his father, to ask him to tell you 
honestly and plainly all about himself, than to 
keep silent on questions which so closely affect 
his health and happiness, his whole future well- 
being. Perhaps many times he has attempted 
to approach the subject himself and the words 
have stuck in his throat. He has thought, ''If 
my father with all his years and wisdom does 



174 The Crime of Silence 

not mention this matter to me, it must be a 
terrible thing for me to speak of it to him. 
There is something mysterious about it. It 
must be one of the things which he regards as 
unmentionable, something to be ashamed of." 
Many boys reason thus and think that their 
father would reprimand them severely for even 
having these forbidden thoughts in their mind. 

I have known boys whose hearts were almost 
breaking for clean, pure, accurate information 
in regard to the mysterious force which they 
have felt growing within them, and which they 
have been unable to understand, but never a 
word of explanation has come from their par- 
ents. Is it strange that boys should hesitate 
to speak to either fathers or mothers on a sub- 
ject which they, with all their experience and 
wisdom, for some mysterious reason treat as if 
it did not exist? 

Do not think, then, because your boy never 
says anything about these tabooed questions, 
that he is not in danger of contamination or 
that he is not already being contaminated. 
Youths, naturally, will not talk about these 
things without encouragement, and if you have 
not brought up your son to look upon you as 



Fathers and Sons 175 

his chum, as his best friend, one to whom he 
can open his heart of hearts, he is in danger. 
One impure companion may contaminate his 
whole hfe before you realize it. It is a crime 
on your part to keep anything back from your 
boy which he ought to know ; and you know a 
gi-eat many things which would be of wonder- 
ful help to him. You know, too, that whole 
schools, colleges, institutions of all kinds, are 
often honeycombed with the misuse or abuse of 
the sexual instinct, and that, in innumerable 
cases, wrong, morbid information upon this 
sacred subject has been the beginning of ruin. 

The church fathers used to teach that the 
sexual desire is evil, is of the devil ; but we now 
know that the impulse itself, rightly directed, 
rightly controlled, is the very insignia of man- 
hood, the very force which vitalizes and gives 
virility, spontaneity and power to the person- 
ality. 

Teach your boy that the quintessence of his 
vitality is dependent upon the maintainence of 
I his sexual integrity, that any impairment or 
abuse of the generative functions upon which 
the reproduction of the race depends, which 
are so intimately connected with every cell of 



176 The Crime of Silence 

the body, involves a loss of physical and mental 1 
creative energy which neither physicians nor 
drugs nor any advertised remedies can restore. 
Impress upon him the fact that his health, his 
future success and welfare will all depend upon 
his preserving physical and mental vigor, and 
that the most dangerous leak in those matters 
is caused by abuse of the sexual instinct. 
Show him that the proper use and the proper 
restraint of this instinct is the very foundation 
of life and character. 

Tell your son that a large percentage of 
those who have lost their grip upon themselves 
are sexual wrecks in one way or another; that 
many of the men who are headed for the poor- 
house, headed for failure, the amount-to-noth- 
ings, the nobodies, the mere human shadows, 
the burned-out beings one sees on every hand 
are those who have been to a greater or less ex- 
tent emasculated through sexual indulgence. 
Their vitality and stamina have been sapped; 
their self-respect killed, their efficiency de- 
stroyed, through lack of self-restraint, perhaps 
on the very threshold of manhood. 

Caution your boy that incontinence, espe- 
cially before complete growth, or in any un- 



Fathers and Sons 177 

lawful way, results in both physical and mental 
dwarfage. Oftentimes indications of this are 
shown in a high squeaky voice, scant beard, 
thin hair, small flabby muscles, morbid sensi- 
tiveness, and moroseness. These are some of 
the signs of lost manhood through the unnat- 
ural drainage of the life force. The unfor- 
tunates who exhibit those signs are forceless, 
characterless, weak, inefficient. In short, there 
is no other early loss which works such havoc 
in the whole life, physically, mentally, and 
morally, as sexual wastage and abuse. 

There is nothing else so insidious, so fatal 
in its blasting, blighting influence as the en- 
trance and entertainment of the first impure 
thought, the performance of the first im- 
piu^e act. Notice how quickly deteriorating 
and destructive forces begin to operate on a 
person who violates the laws of chastity and 
purity. In a few months, even the purest girl 
may become lower than the animals. It seems 
as if the Creator regards the integrity of this 
instinct, upon which the very life, character, 
and destiny of the race depend, as so sacred, 
and has placed such a terrible curse upon its 
degradation that there is no human evil so 



178 The Crime of Silence 

great as that which follows its violation or 
abuse. The man who becomes dishonest, or 
even commits crime, doesn't become so thor- 
oughly demoralized, animahzed, brutalized, 
doesn't stoop so low as he who violates his 
sexual integrity. The most frightful diseases 
known to mankind are never generated in right 
living, never developed among people who live 
purely and cleanly ; but the moment human be- 
ings transgress the sacred law of chastity they 
pay an awful penalty, the price of body, char- 
acter, and soul destruction. 

The best physicians tell us that there is noth- 
ing else which will so completely deplete and 
devitalize, so quickly sap that strength and vi- 
tality which could otherwise be turned into 
power and efficiency, as the abuse of the sacred 
sex instinct. Sacred, I say, because by means 
of it the Creator has made man his partner 
in the perpetuation of the race. Sacred, I re- 
peat emphatically, because all that is beauti- 
ful and clean, all that is grandest and noblest 
in life, all that is worth while, depends upon its 
integrity. 

Fathers should give their boys specific rea- 
sons for the necessity of living chastely, purely. 



Fathers and Sons 179 

They should show them that they cannot from 
any point of view afford to be devitalized. 
Most boys are ambitious to make physical rec- 
ords, and if a father will show his son that not 
only will his spiritual nature be ruined, but that 
nothing else will so fatally sap his vital energy 
and physical force as by tampering with his 
sexual instincts; that the force which wins in 
athletic contests, as in life's battle, will be seri- 
ously impaired, and that he who indulges in 
secret sins is liable to become a physical and 
mental nobody, unsexed, he will make a lasting 
impression on his boy's mind. 

Teach your son that it is only during the 
years when the sexual function is intact, during 
the years of its integrity, that men achieve any- 
thing worth while; show him that men who 
have sapped their sexual life by excesses and 
abuses have become partially unsexed, and with 
the unsexing have lost their mental vigor, their 
creative energy, that force which is back of 
courage, back of initiative, back of all power 
and efficiency. Point out to him that to the 
degree in which a man becomes emasculated 
does he lose his forceful qualities and tend to 
become a nobody. Show him how the great 



180 The Crime of Silence 

failure army is full of these devitalized, emas- 
culated beings who have lost that vitahty which 
must back up all achievement, that creative 
force which is the secret of all effectiveness, re- 
sourcefulness, and ingenuity. Make him un- 
derstand that executive power evaporates with 
the exhaustion of sexual vitality. 

Stamp it indelibly on your boy's conscious- 
ness that all his future, his success, his reputa- 
tion, his happiness, will depend upon the pre- 
servation of his physical vigor. Teach him that 
the greatest things that will come to him in this 
world are husbandhood and fatherhood, and 
that his future wife's happiness and well-being, 
his children's destiny, — what life will mean to 
them, their achievement, their happiness, their 
welfare, the character of their own descendants, 
— are in no small degree in his hands, and that 
all these immeasurably important things de- 
pend mainly upon the vigilance with which he 
guards the purity of his own sexual life. 

In other words, show him that just in pro- 
portion as he preserves his sexual integrity and 
purity will he tend to become a complete, full- 
rounded, vigorous, masterful man. 

Some fathers seem to think that merely 



Fathers and Sons 181 

warning their sons to keep away from vicious 
companions will protect them from the foul 
sources of contamination. But mere ''don'ts," 
negative formulas, will never safeguard a 
youth. The only way to protect him is by giv- 
ing him positive instruction which will raise his 
ideals, increase his self-respect, and make him 
think more of himself. 

Without giving specific reasons such as I 
have outlined, to which many more might be 
added, a father might preach to his boy until 
doomsday about the thing being wrong, and 
even wicked, and yet not make any positive or 
lasting impression. But when he gives him 
reasons for continence which appeal to him, he 
makes a salutary and permanent impression. 
This is where the father's influence especially 
comes in, because no mother or teacher, how- 
ever affectionate or faithful, can put herself in 
a position to really appreciate a boy's situa- 
tion. The father alone can fully enter into it. 
He alone can completely realize and sympa- 
thize with his son's feelings during his danger- 
ous years. 

A boy who is properly instructed in sex 
hygiene will resent every insult to a woman, no 



182 - The Crime of Silence 

matter whose daughter or sister she may be; 
for he will have been taught to reverence 
woman, and because of her comparative phys- 
ical weakness to consider himself her natural 
protector. He will regard any injury to a 
woman, no matter what her class or condition, 
as a crime against womanhood, and also against 
his own manhood. He will never forget that 
one who contributes to a girl's ruin, directly or 
indirectly, is guilty of a crime, and that this 
crime totally unfits him for marriage; that it 
mars his ideal of womanhood, and that he can 
never have quite the same regard for women, 
can never quite have the same respect for them 
or for himself as before. 

The father worthy of his fatherhood should 
instil into his boy's mind such a high ideal of 
womanhood, such a profound respect for her 
person, that any suggestion of impurity or in- 
delicacy regarding her sex nature would be un- 
thinkable. He should teach his boy how won- 
derfully sacred the mother instinct is, how pure 
and clean ; and how imperative it is for his own 
future happiness, for the welfare of the home 
and the race, to protect females from insult, 
from abuse, or from any unholy liberty. 



Fathers and Sons 183 

Every boy should be trained with the idea that 
he is the protector of woman. He should be as 
ready to protect any other woman from insult 
as he would his own sister. 

In other words, I believe that it is possible 
to train a boy to have such lofty ideas of chiv- 
alry and the sacredness of the female sex that 
unholy desires and foul passions will never 
master him. Every time he is tempted to do 
wrong, the image of his ideal of the girl he 
hopes some time to make his wife, will stand 
out before him and so shame him that yielding 
to wrong will be unthinkable. 

Nothing else which you can possibly do for 
your boy will mean so much to his future as to 
instil into the very marrow of his being the re- 
solve to come to his wedding day with his ideal 
of womanhood as pure and unstained as the 
driven snow; to preserve his own purity as the 
most sacred thing in his life, and to come to the 
altar as clean in mind and body as the girl he 
is about to marry. If you train him so that, 
whenever he is tempted to violate the sanctity 
of the sex instinct, he will bring up in his 
mind's eye the image of his ideal of woman- 
hood, it will be a wonderful help in the prac- 



184 The Crime of Silence 

tice of self-control. It will kill temptation 
and make him ashamed of the mere thought or 
suggestion of wrong-doing. 

Some sins are unforgivable, and sexual sin 
is one of them. The destruction of another's 
character, pushing a human being down to- 
wards degradation, for the sake of a temporary 
sinful gratification, is a crime against one's 
own soul, and a properly instructed youth will 
understand that there is no real pleasure, that 
there can he none, in the commission of such a 
crime. 

If any of you fathers find that your son has 
been so unfortunate as to contract the habit of 
self -abuse, remember that he is in a perilous 
condition, and do not frighten him by unneces- 
sary harshness. He is already suffering all he 
can endure. I have kno\^n fathers by their 
cruelty at such times to Mot out all hope in 
their boy's mind that he could ever get relief 
from his trouble. Yet hope and expectation 
of relief are absolutely imperative, and often 
the only things that will save a youth in such 
peril. His mind is already depressed. He is 
melancholy and morose. This is the time when 
he needs your sympathy, not your criticism, 



Fathers and Sons 185 

not your condemnation. Do not condemn him 
with your head ; take him to your heart ; advise 
him ; get his confidence ; show him that you can 
help him. Above all else, keep him out of the 
hands of quacks! 

There is no other subject which so troubles 
and worries the average youth of a certain age 
as the fear that something is the matter with 
his sexual life. The very secrecy which sur- 
rounds it tremendously aggravates his worry, 
because he does not dare consult his parents 
about it. Not one boy in a thousand, under 
such circumstances, would frankly go to his 
father for advice, for he feels guilty; and he 
would not dare to go to an older friend, or 
even to the family physician. There are 
medical quacks who know this only too well, 
and they take every possible advantage of his 
delicate situation. 

There are thousands of parents who think 
that their boys have never known evil, that 
they can not by any possibility be contami- 
nated, and yet they may be constantly an- 
swering advertisements concerning ''lost vital- 
itj^" "lost manhood," and the ''errors of 
youth." These parents little realize the tr^- 



186 The Crime of Silence 

mendous harvest which the quacks are reaping 
from their sons, through the effects of their 
subtle advertisements and criminal literature 
describing the results of lost manhood. 

Away with this foolish criminal mask of 
silence which leaves your son at the mercy of 
such charlatans! If you have not safe- 
guarded him with proper instruction at the 
outset, at the most dangerous period in his life 
when he has stood tiptoe on the threshold of 
opening manhood, at the very door of his 
future, at least come to his rescue now and save 
him from becoming a victim of all sorts of 
quacks, who will bleed him, mislead him, and 
possibly drive him to utter ruin. 

Faith in womankind 
Beats with his blood, and trust in all things high 
Comes easy to him; and, though he trip and fall, 
He shall not blind his soul with clay. 

— Alfred Tennyson. 



CHAPTER XI 

SOWING WILD OATS AND THE HARVEST 

The virtues of the man and the woman are the same. 

— Antisthenes. 

I am ignorant of any one quality that is admirable in woman 
which is not equally so in man! I do not except even modesty 
and gentleness of nature; nor do I know one vice or folly which 
Is not equally destestable in both. — DEA]sr Swift. 

''Who are responsible for the introduction 
of venereal diseases into marriage and the eon- 
sequent wreckage of the hves of innocent wives 
and children?" 

Answering his own interrogation in the pre- 
ceding paragraph, Dr. Prince Morrow says, 
"As a rule, men who have presented a fair ex- 
terior of regular and correct living, — often the 
men of good business and social position, — the 
men who, indulging in what they regard as the 
harmless dissipation of 'sowing wild oats,' have 
contracted syphilis." 

There is no crime followed by more vicious 

187 



188 The Crime of Silence 

consequences than that which has been desig- 
nated by the apparently innocent phrase, 
''sowing wild oats/' nor is there any other which 
has hitherto been treated so indulgently by 
society or been so lightly regarded for the most 
part even by men and women of blameless lives. 
In fact, people have seemed to consider it really 
necessary for young men to get this experience 
and to believe that they would be stronger and 
wiser for it afterwards. We might as well say 
that a piece of marble is whiter and purer be- 
cause there is an ink stain on it. The Agri- 
cultural Department at Washington might as 
well advise farmers to sow weeds or thistles 
with their wheat in order to get better crops. 

Yet many youths have been given the im- 
pression by their own fathers, or by physicians, 
or have gathered from something they have 
read, that for health reasons they should grat- 
ify the sexual desire in the best way they can 
until they are married. 

How often we hear intelligent, educated 
fathers indulgently say of immoral sons, "Boys 
will be boys, and they will be all the stronger 
for sowing their wild oats." 

The idea that a youth would be better fitted 



Sowing Wild Oats 189 

for life, would be stronger, wiser, more normal, 
for the experience of sowing his wild oats — 
that is, for indulging in immorality, in vulgar- 
ity, — is one of the most pernicious and fatal 
delusions that ever crept into the human brain. 
The father who thinks his boy must have his 
wild-oats-sowing season in order to become a 
man is not fit to bring up a child, and the State 
should take it away from him. 

Yet there are fathers who encourage their 
boys in the practice of immorahty. 1 know of 
a noted physician who wrote his son in Yale ad- 
vising him, for the sake of his health, to find 
some girl in New Haven with whom he could 
practically live while going through his 
academic course! A father who would give 
such counsel to his son should be indicted by a 
grand jury for soul murder. The result in 
this instance was that the son went to the dogs, 
and finally loathed his father for the criminal 
advice that ruined his health and his career at 
the outset. 

Many another young man, while sowing his 
wild oats, has formed vicious habits which have 
dogged his steps and handicapped him all his 
life. If a man of coarse fiber, he has probably 



190 The Crime or Silence 

sunk to the level of his own bestiality and has 
failed to realize the true value of his "might 
have been/' — of the higher, better, more suc- 
cessful and happier life which he has lost. But 
to a naturally fine-grained man, under such 
conditions, life often seems but a mockery, 
with its chalice of joy presented invitingly to 
his lips only to be dashed rudely away and shiv- 
ered to fragments by the demon of passion who 
accompanies him everywhere. He may put on 
a brave front to the world and to others seem 
even happy, but to himself his forced laughter 
echoes mockingly and drearily through the 
empty chambers of his soul. Such a man 
might well exclaim with the gifted "poet of 
remorse,"^ — 

Though wit may flash from fluent lips, and mirth distract the 
breast. 

Through midnight hours that yield no more their former hope 
of rest; 

'Tis but as ivy leaves around the ruined turret wreathe, 

lAll green and wildly fresh without, but worn and gray be- 
neath. 

A great many boys are brought up with the 
idea that it is not very sinful to visit disorderly 
houses — that it is not a millionth part as bad as 
the seduction of a pure, innocent girl. I have 



Sowing Wild Oats 191 

heard fathers say that they would rather thek 
sons would consort with fast women, that they 
Avould rather that they should seduce innocent 
girls, than marry socially beneath them. One 
man I know told his son that the great thing to 
be careful about was not to get caught in his 
escapades with women! 

Is it any wonder that such infamous moral 
standards and such base teachings as these not 
only ruin multitudes of boys, but also imperil 
the happiness and lives of a multitude of un- 
fortunate girls and women? 

To what end is all this? The monstrous 
fallacy that Nature has so erred in her con- 
struction of man that he should become lower 
in the scale of life than the beasts in order to 
conserve health is exploded. The idea that 
incontinence is a health preserver for young 
men has been set at rest for all time by many 
of the most eminent physicians in the world. 
Sir W. R. Gowers, M. D., F.R.S., lecturer of 
the Medical Society of London, says, ''The 
opinions which on grounds falsely called 
'physiological' suggest or permit unchastity 
are terribly prevalent among young men, but 
they are absolutely false. I assert that no man 



192 The Crime of Silence 

ever yet was in the slightest degree or way the 
worse for continence or the better for incon- 
tinence." 

Sir Andrew Clarke emphatically declares, 
''Continence elevates the whole nature, in- 
creases energy, and sharpens insight." 

Another distinguished physician says, ''It is 
a frequent observation instilled into the young 
at all ages : 'I am told it is very bad for me to 
be continent; my health will suffer from it.' 
No greater lie was ever invented. It is simply 
a base invention to cover sin, and has no 
foundation in fact." 

In the Year Book of the National Society 
for the Scientific Study of Education in Eng- 
land we find this significant paragraph: "We 
expect of physicians explicit and positive con- 
tradiction of the fallacy current among men 
and sometimes sanctioned by medical authori- 
ties that sexual continence is very harmful to 
health." 

Authoritative statements might be multi- 
plied not only to bury the ancient lie that un- 
chastity makes a man healthy, but also to prove 
that its effect is exactly the opposite. 

To put it on the very lowest grounds, I am 



Sowing Wild Oats 193 

certain that, if young men knew and realized 
the fearful risks to health alone that they run 
by indulging in these gross impurities and dis- 
sipations known as sowing wild oats, they 
would put them by with a shudder of disgust 
and aversion. 

When physicians tell young men who have 
contracted a terrible venereal disease that, even 
with constant treatment, there is no possibility 
of cure in less than three or four years, and 
that they may never be cured, the sufferers 
often give way to utter despair. This is espe- 
cially true of young men who are about to 
marry. Many of them lack the moral stamina, 
the courage to make a clean breast of their 
troubles, or to release their fiancee, to postpone 
their marriage, and the results are terrible suf- 
fering, degradation, and often death from the 
transmission of this frightful plague. 

Not long ago a young man in an agony of 
remorse and shame put an end to his life on his 
wedding day. His physician had told him 
that, owing to sexual trouble, he was in no con- 
dition to marry, and that he must postpone his 
marriage. But the wedding day was fixed, 
and, too much ashamed to tell the truth to the 



194 The Crime of Silence 

girl who loved and trusted him, he committed 
suicide while the terrified bride-to-be waited 
at the altar. 

Another tragic case is told by a prominent 
physician who was invited to the marriage of a 
beautiful young girl whom he knew. The 
marriage was to be a fashionable one, and so- 
ciety leaders where both the young people lived 
were to attend. A week before the wedding, 
however, the young man had been ''out with 
the fellows'' sowing wild oats, celebrating his 
last days of bachelorhood. Afterwards he had 
to consult a physician, who did not tell him 
that he must postpone his marriage, but said 
that marriage for him at any time would be a 
crime. The night before the wedding the 
young man shot himself. 

So lightly has this crime of sowing wild oats 
been treated, and so ignorant have women been 
kept of the awful enormity of the consequences, 
that it is not unusual to hear a romantic girl, 
who mistakes wickedness for manliness, say, 
in speaking of a man, ''Oh, he is too good. I 
like a fellow who has sown his wild oats, who 
has had some experience, who has seen life. I 
have no use for the man 'who knows nothing of 



Sowing Wild Oats 195 

the world/ 'who has been brought up in a cage, 
tied to his mother's apron strings.' " 

How Httle do such romantic girls, how little 
do any girls or women, realize what they do 
when they marry impure, immoral men. How 
ignorant they are of the true meaning of sow- 
ing wild oats, — how little they dream what 
frightful harvests are bound to follow the sow- 
ing. 

Indeed, in the long run, they are the greatest 
sufferers, for one of the most terrible results of 
the sowing of wild oats is the hideous after- 
math of suffering inflicted on innocent, unsus- 
pecting women and their yet unborn children. 

A distinguished physician estimated that a 
large percentage of all the operations per- 
formed by specialists in diseases of women in 
this country are the result of venereal infec- 
tion, and that an equal percentage of all the 
deaths due to inflammatory diseases peculiar 
to women are the result of this infection. 

In multitudes of cases trusting young wives 
have suffered untold tortures from vile dis- 
eases communicated to them by their husbands 
who had contracted them while sowing wild 
oats in their youth. Formerly the helpless vie- 



196 The Crime of Silence 

tims were kept in ignorance of the real facts by 
male physicians who would not reveal to them 
the cause of their suffering and the disfigure- 
ment of their unfortunate children. 

It is well known that mental deficiency in 
children, and every kind of physical deformity, 
even the birth of monstrosities, are a part of 
the harvest reaped from the wild oats sow- 
ing. 

In twenty-seven months over six hundred 
children, the victims of a loathsome disease in- 
herited from their fathers, passed through the 
most piteous children's ward in a Chicago hos- 
pital. All but twenty-nine of these children 
were under ten years of age, "and," said Jane 
Addams, ''doubtless a number of them had 
been victims of that wi^etched tradition that a 
man afflicted with this incurable disease might 
cure himself at the expense of innocence.'' It 
is a well known fact that thousands of children 
who are born blind or become blind at birth 
suffer this ghastly affliction because of their 
fathers' sins. 

How can a man face an innocent child who 
bears in its body the evidences of his unlawful 
passions, who must carry through life the curse 



Sowing Wild Oats 197 

of his sin, without loathing himself? A large 
part of the insane and criminal class, the sexual 
perverts, the idiots, the imbeciles, the physi- 
cally defective, and tens of thousands of in- 
valids are such because of this sin of sins. 

Everywhere we see wretched, innocent chil- 
dren whose lives will be crippled or totally 
wrecked because of their father's sin. Many 
of them are dwarfed, deformed, and have phys- 
ical or mental defects, or idiosyncracies which 
will follow them through life. Verily, the sins 
of the fathers are visited upon the children, and 
the children's children. 

Think, too, of the unhappy mother, who 
must often endure the double agony of suffer- 
ing herself — often undergoing surgical mutila- 
tion, — and seeing her children suffer ! 

Miss Addams cites a pathetic case of a wid- 
owed mother in Chicago afflicted with a terrible 
disease which she had contracted from her hus- 
band. The unfortunate mother was so terri- 
fied for fear of spreading the infection to her 
children that she offered to leave them forever 
if there was no other way to save them from 
the horrible suffering she herself was enduring. 

The number of young women whose health 



198 The Crime or Silence 

has been wrecked by marrying immoral men 
will never be known. ''How dismal/' says Dr. 
Valentine, "is the history of many a young 
woman who marries with all the accompani- 
ments of a wedding celebration. From their 
husbands' latent disease many of them contract 
conditions which alter their lives and even their 
characters. They suffer from backache, uri- 
nary disorders, localized peritonitis, loss of their 
healthful beauty, lassitude, hysteria, sterility, 
miscarriages, or death." 

Referring more fully to the awful danger 
the wife runs of being infected by an immoral 
husband, Christabel Pankhurst, in ''Plain 
Facts About a Great Evil," quotes Dr. 
Prince Morrow, who says: "'The condi- 
tions created by the marriage relation ren- 
der the wife a helpless and unresisting victim. 
The matrimonial bond is a chain which binds 
and fetters the woman completely, making her 
the passive recipient of the germs of any sexual 
disease her husband may harbor. On her 
wedding night she may, and often does, receive 
unsuspectingly the poison of a disease which 
may seriously affect her health and kill her 
children, or, by extinguishing her capacity for 



Sowing Wild Oats 199 

conception, may sweep away all the most cher- 
ished hopes and aspirations of married hfe. 
She is an innocent in every sense of the 
word. She is incapable of foreseeing, power- 
less to prevent this injury. She often pays 
with her life for her bhnd confidence in the 
man who ignorantly or carelessly passes over 
to her a disease which he has received from a 
prostitute. The victims are for the most part 
young and virtuous women, — idolized daugh- 
ters, the very flower of womankind.' " 

It would be hard to name a crime so das- 
tardly as for a man deliberately to defile and 
poison the body of the clean, sweet girl who 
loves and marries him; deliberately to inflict 
upon his children a foul disease, — deformity, 
idiocy, premature death. Yet this is done, 
with a frequency which has at length aroused 
our best physicians to the struggle for pubhc 
enlightenment and protection. 

A prominent physician, invited by the editor 
of The Ladies' Home Journal to produce 
statistics on the sex question, says that there 
are more than eight million people in the 
United States to-day suffering from the direct 
or indirect infection of sexual diseases : that in 



200 The Crime or Silence 

New York City alone there are many, many 
thousand men and women afflicted, to say 
nothing of httle girls of five and ten years of 
age who are cursed with the germs of some 
of those loathsome diseases. The great white 
plague, according to this authoritj^ is a mere 
incident as compared with the great black 
plague. "The horrible and distressing opera- 
tions upon innocent wives," he says, "the in- 
creasing sterility of married women, can be ex- 
plained and avoided. The ruin of many inno- 
cent boys and girls who come in contact with 
the germs scattered round them can be 
stopped." He further states, "When I add 
that over eight out of ten j^oung men from fif- 
teen to thirty years of age are suffering from 
the direct or indirect causes of this sexual sin, 
that thirty-five per cent, of these cases will 
bring mother, grandmother, or children to the 
hospital, to early graves, you will agree that it 
is absolutely necessary to speak plainly." 

Much of this terrible suffering of innocent 
women and children is due to what is called 
professional etiquette among physicians. 
Multitudes of men have hitherto been shielded 
in their damnable immorality by physicians un- 



Sowing Wild Oats 201 

der the pretext of this shibboleth of profes- 
sional etiquette. They are bound to report to 
the Board of Health cases of such compara- 
tively innocent diseases as measles or chicken 
pox. If a case of smallpox, cholera, or some 
other virulent disease were not promptly re- 
ported to the health authorities and all neces- 
sary precautions taken to prevent the spread of 
the contagion, there would be a popular outcry. 
If a person is found infected with leprosy, the 
whole country is up in arms, and the unfortu- 
nate and wholl}^ innocent sufferer is driven 
from the community, isolated from civilization. 
But, simply because men, not men and women, 
make the laws, physicians are not obliged to 
report cases of moral leprosy, the foulest and 
most deadly of all diseases. 

One of the most horrible features of moral 
leprosy is the appalling facility with which its 
physical contagion is conveyed to the inno- 
cent. 

Not long ago a very suave and attractive 
young man on leaving a social gathering in 
Philadelphia kissed the hands of the five young 
ladies who had been his dancing partners dur- 
ing the evening. In a short time all five de- 



202 The Crime of Silence 

veloped a hideous venereal disease which has 
made their marriage practically impossible, 
and ruined not only their potential mother- 
hood, but, practically, their lives. 

In innumerable cases fathers have communi- 
cated this disease to their children by kissing 
and fondhng them. It has been passed along 
through the exchange of lead-pencils, by put- 
ting them in the mouth, by the use of towels, 
and in countless other ways. Yet the moral 
lepers are allowed to go unchecked on their 
death dealing way. 

The ethics of the medical profession in re- 
gard to cloaking the resultant evils of man's 
immorality are, however, rapidly undergoing 
a great change, and the physician of the future 
who protects the reputation of a moral leper, 
at the expense of his unsuspecting and helpless 
victims, will be boycotted by all decent people. 
He will be regarded as accessory before the 
fact in contributing to the defilement and suf- 
fering of innocent beings. The reputable 
physician of to-morrow is not going to help the 
tainted to spread the contagion of the vilest 
of diseases. Even though the man-made laws 
support him in concealing the truth, he will not 



Sowing Wild Oats 203 

remain tongue-tied regarding moral leprosy 
when he is in duty bound to the public to re- 
port cases of measles. 

But the average old-time physician is horri- 
fied at the very idea of making public a state- 
ment in regard to the health of a patient which 
would injure the patient's reputation. To 
divulge a professional secret is dishonorable. 
But there is no hesitation in making public the 
knowledge of any other crime, however much it 
may reflect on the reputation of the criminal. 

Knowledge of any other crime against so- 
ciety, any other disease than this, which in- 
volves secret sin, is not regarded as a profes- 
sional secret. The doctor who would conceal 
the truth about a murder or a robbery because 
the perpetrator happened to be a patient of his 
would rightly be regarded as an enemy of so- 
ciety. Why should the crime of silence in re- 
gard to an offence which destroys the soul as 
well as the body of the offender himself, and 
causes untold suffering, perhaps death to 
others, be countenanced by the law and the 
medical profession? 

It is about time that the curse of secret im- 
morality should be dragged out of its hiding 



204 The Crime or Silence 

place and exposed to the light. If every phy- 
sician was compelled by law — and it is a crime 
against society that he is not, — to be truthful 
in these matters, this black i^lague of sexual 
immorality, with its evil progeny, would be 
tremendously circumscribed. If every young 
man, every husband and father, knew that his 
secret sin would be made public, that he would 
be disgraced in the eyes of his family, his com- 
munity, there would be comparatively few 
male — or female — prostitutes. If the sex that 
suffers most from this great social pest had a 
voice in making the laws that pertain to it, it 
would quickly be put under a penalty equal to 
its enormity. If there was no other reason for 
giving the vote to women, this one would be 
sufficient. Men will never legislate against 
their own sexual sins. There will always be 
immunity for the sexual criminal until woman 
gets the power locked up in the ballot. 

Already women physicians and women's 
organizations have succeeded in two states, 
Iowa and Vermont, in securing the passage of 
a law whicli recjuires a physician to report a 
case of venereal disease to the Board of Health 



Sowing Wild Oats 205 

as he does a case of smallpox, diphtheria, scar- 
let fever or measles. It is to be hoped that all 
the other states in the Union will quickly fol- 
low the example set by Iowa and Vermont. 

One of the most unfortunate things about 
the sowing of wild oats is that the practice, 
when once started, — ^whose only excuse, let it 
not be forgotten, is celibacy, — is continued by 
a large majority of men after marriage and 
continued not infrequently all through their 
married life. 

It is a strange fact that even many men who 
lead exemplary lives at home, and who are care- 
ful not to do anything which can bring pain to 
their families, throw off their restraint when 
they are away from home, in distant cities, and 
especially when traveling abroad, and do all 
sorts of immoral things which nothing could 
induce them to do in their own little village or 
small town. 

A painful instance of this was brought to 
light not long ago in a large Eastern city, when 
a man regarded as a pillar of the church and of 
society in his own town was discovered to be 
habitually leading a ''double life" when away 



206 The Crime of Silence 

from home. Cases of this kind are all too fre- 
quent among so-called reputable men. 

The fear of public opinion keeps many men 
of indifferent virtue straight in small towns. 
They have a terror of gossip and are afraid of 
possible social scandal. Pride of their stand- 
ing in the community, and especially of their 
position in the church, is a constant restraining 
influence. The wrong done to wife and chil- 
dren sits lightly on their conscience, but they 
are held in check by fear of what their neigh- 
bors will say. The majority of men would be 
polygamous but for the restraining influence 
of their egotism and the fear of the Mrs. 
Grundy of their small community, but when 
they go into strange cities they feel a sense of 
freedom, and, under cover of secrecy and the 
practical certainty that no one at home will 
ever know what they have done, they give 
license to their grosser nature. 

This is well known to purveyors of vice, and 
many of the questionable things which are 
shown sightseers in large cities are maintained 
largely for the sightseers themselves. The 
city people do not patronize them much. 



Sowing Wh.d Oats 207 

Many indecent places in the city of Paris are 
kept up mainly for tourists, and are patron- 
ized, largely, by men who are quite decent in 
their home towns. 

Men from the country and from out-of-town 
places who visit houses of prostitution in the 
cities little realize how much they contribute 
to the awful degradation of women. But re- 
member, my friends, who loosen up your morals 
when you go away from home, that every poor 
girl you find in any of those vile places is some- 
body's daughter, may be somebody's sister, as 
dear to some father or mother as your daughter 
is to you or your wife, that her life is just as 
sacred in the eyes of her Maker as the lives of 
your own sisters and mother. Do not forget 
that most prostitutes were innocent victims 
lured to brothels to gratify men's base passions. 

Do not think, because you are away from 
home, that you are away from responsibility, 
that you can get away from the inexorable laws 
of nature and virtue. If you break them any- 
where in the universe, you must pay the price 
of a stain upon your manhood, the loss of self- 
respect, the acquirement of personal degrada- 



208 The Crime or Silence 

tion from which you can never escape. You 
have contributed to the downfall of human be- 
ings. You have contributed to the havoc of 
their deplorable lives, to their wretchedness, 
their demoraUzation. You are personally re- 
sponsible. You are an accomplice in their 
ruin, you are in league with their murderers. 

Do not hypnotize yourself with the idea that, 
when away from home, you can drop your 
moral standards, draw a curtain over your 
ideals, drag those whom you are bound by 
every law of your being to protect down to 
lower depths, and then return to your innocent 
and trusting families thinking that these 
wretched girls mean nothing to you because 
they happen to be strangers. No; you can- 
not escape the consequences of your sin. It 
may come back to mock you in the ruin of your 
own innocent daughter or sister in some resort 
of vice. In some way or other it will again 
and again meet you face to face. 

Theosophists believe that the man who 
wrongs a woman, who debauches the souls of 
others, is in the life beyond the grave perpetu- 
ally tormented by the spirits of those whom he 
had injured on earth, that they never cease 



Sowing Wild Oats 209 

following him until his soul is purged and puri- 
fied by frightful suffering. 

Whether we agree with this theory or not, we 
can not blind ourselves to the truth that there 
is certainly some place and time for the squar- 
ing of all our accounts. We know that the 
universe is governed by scientific laws ; we know 
that not an infinitesimal particle of matter in 
this world is ever lost, and that every cause has 
its legitimate effect. Man can not escape the 
working of the universal law. It is just as 
certain as doom that those men who even con- 
tribute to woman's ruin must sometime, some- 
where suffer the just punishment of their acts. 
People who know him in this world may know 
nothing of his damnable acts, but the soul that 
sins, no matter how he covers up his crimes, 
shall ultimately pay their fearful price. In 
view of all this, the theosophic theory does not 
seem unreasonable, albeit the sexual sinner does 
not have to go to the world beyond to reap the 
consequences of his acts. 

Lecky, the historian, speaking of the un- 
fortunate woman, the victim of man's lust, 
says, ''She is the most mournful and the most 
awful figure in history. She remains while 



210 The Crime of Silence 

creeds and civilizations rise and fall, — the 
eternal sacrifice of humanity, blasted for the 
sins of the people." 

How much longer will society sanction this 
blot on our civilization? How much longer 
shall we continue to have sex in sin? — to stone 
the woman and let the man go free, and thus 
perpetuate the presence of "the most mournful 
and the most awful figure in history"? 

It is ''up to" this generation, now that the 
light of knowledge and truth has been turned 
on the dark places, to see to it that men's self- 
ish, animal desires shall not continue to blast 
a large proportion of the very flower of the 
human race. 

The sowing of wild oats^ with its frightful 
harvest of human misery, degradation, crime, 
and death, must go. 



CHAPTER XII 

MEDICAL QUACKS AND "lOST MANHOOD" 

Give me that man 
That is not passion's slave, and I will wear him 
In my heart's core, ay, in my heart of hearts. 

— Shakespeare. 

There is a story of a certain man afflicted 
with a painful disease who had traveled far and 
wide in search of a cure, and tried all sorts of 
remedies and physicians without avail. One 
night he dreamed that a Presence came to him 
and said, "Brother, hast thou tried all the 
means of cure?" The man replied, "I have 
tried all." ''Nay," said the Presence, ''come 
with me, and I will show thee a heahng bath 
which has escaped thy notice." The afflicted 
man followed, and the Presence led him to a 
clear pool of water, and said, "Plunge thyself 
in this water and thou shalt surely recover," 
and thereupon he vanished. The man plunged 
into the water, and, on coming out, lo ! his dis- 
ease had left him, and at the same moment he 

211 



212 The Crime of Silence 

saw written above the pool the word ''Re- 
nouncef^ 

Now all this time the man had been harbor- 
ing a secret sin, but in the clear, cleansing 
waters of the pool he had renounced it, — and 
was healed. 

Renunciation is the price of a strong, clean 
character, a noble manhood. If you would 
wear ''the white flower of a blameless life," you 
must renounce the things that lead to sin, you 
must keep away from the things that would 
stain your manhood, smirch your honor. 

Speaking of his youth, when other young 
fellows wanted him to be ''one of the boys," "to 
take a drink," Edison said, "I thought I had 
a better use for my brain. I wanted all the 
brain power I could get. I wanted to increase 
the efficiency of my life and not diminish it, 
not demoralize and benumb it. I did not want 
to take into my mouth an enemy to steal away 
my brain. I wanted to do the things which 
would increase, not diminish my brain power; 
which would increase, not lessen, my possibili- 
ties ; which would increase and not destroy my 
resources ; something which would increase my 
powers of investigation, of discovery; some- 



Quacks and "Lost Manhood" 213 

thing which would increase my inventive abil- 
ity, not destroy it, and I said to myself : 'I 
will let that greatest enemy of the race, that 
enemy which has taken hold of more men and 
women, ruined more careers, destroyed more 
happiness, than anything else in the world, 
alone.' " 

There are several places in the world where 
clean, pure rivers empty into other rivers which 
drain large factory districts. The water in the 
latter is contaminated with all sorts of chemi- 
cals and refuse from the factories. It is turgid 
and dirty. For long distances those rivers 
sometimes run side by side with quite clean-cut 
lines of demarcation between the pure and the 
filthy; but gradually, as they flow down to- 
wards the sea, they mingle, and after a while 
the pure stream is lost. The filthy, muddy 
stream has absorbed and contaminated every 
drop of the pure water. 

How often we see a similar thing in human 
life ; where the muddy, turgid, filthy stream of 
impure associations contaminates, and finally 
absorbs, the stream of purity and innocence 
running beside it until both streams merge into 
one black and murky river. 



214 The Crime or Silence 

If you have been so unfortunate as to be- 
come soiled by contact with such a foul stream, 
don't lose heart and think there is no hope of 
purging yourself of your uncleanness. Above 
all else, don't go to sexual quacks, or resort to 
remedies suggested in their advertisements. 

Tens of thousands of young men are being 
seriously injured through the influence of these 
advertisements, which delineate in the most 
subtle and suggestive language the terrible con- 
sequences of sexual perversion. Frequently 
their authors slyly distribute little booklets on 
the street, when there are no policemen about, 
— for their distribution is against the law, — 
under the guise of memorandum books, but 
which really contain poisonous descriptions of 
the awful results of youthful error and the dis- 
eases resulting from sexual sin. 

All these medical blackguards are ''out for 
the cash." They have not the slightest re- 
gard for the welfare of the young man about 
whom they seem so solicitous, and they v/ill 
rob him of his last penny without a shadow of 
compunction. I have known many instances 
where they have advised youths to borrow 
money, or even sell their belongings rather than 



Quacks and "Lost Manhood" 215 

take the awful consequences that thej^ are as- 
sured would follow non-treatment. I have 
known college boys to pawn clothing, pledge 
their books, and borrow money of their student 
friends, ostensibly for other purposes, but in 
reality to secure the "cure-all" remedy or to 
get the wonderful "advice" described in these 
subtle advertisements, which frighten away the 
peace and happiness of thousands of splendid 
boys who, perhaps, have made a single false 
step under great temptation, but who, at heart, 
are clean and pure. 

The quacks tell these victims of youthful 
error that loss of vitality thus caused is more 
fatal than many times the same amount of 
blood drawn directly from the heart, — just as 
if blood drawn directly from the heart is worse 
than if drawn from the foot! They describe 
in lurid colors the symptoms of lost vigor, of 
lost manhood, and other evils which follow sex- 
ual sin. So vividly do they picture these 
things and so seductively do they work upon the 
youthful imagination that the victim is con- 
stantly watching for and expecting predicted 
symptoms, until sometimes his mind actually 
becomes unbalanced. In many cases the per- 



216 The Crime or Silence 

plexed youth is cursed with mind wandering. 
He can not focus his attention upon his studies 
or his work. His parents and teachers can not 
imagine what is the matter with him, for they 
do not see the worm that is eating its way into 
his heart and slowly blighting the young life 
long before it comes to maturity. 

While the consequences of continued sexual 
indiscretions can hardly be overrated, there is 
probably not the least warrant or justification 
for a hundredth part of the worry and the 
wretched anxiety of these unhappy youths. 
Their fears are worked upon by the criminal 
quack advertisements and the literature of the 
blackguards who are bleeding them. These 
vile advertisers become experts in fishing for 
''suckers." They know how to put out the 
tempting bait ; and, when the victims are finally 
drawn into a quack's office, he says to himself : 
"Just as I expected. Those advertisements 
did the work." 

These medical quacks describe the symptoms 
of the victim of self-abuse in terms something 
like the following, "Confused mentality in the 
morning, dizziness on rising, a bad taste in the 
mouth, a wandering mind, inability to focus 



Quacks and ''Lost Manhood" 217 

the thought and to hold it upon a certain sub- 
ject. Nervousness, despondency, a feehng of 
debility, and general lack of energy, ambition, 
and life." "Solitariness" is also one of the 
symptoms that they emphasize, an inclination 
to remain by oneself, to shun people. 

Now these are common symptoms of almost 
every boy and girl during the years of rapid 
growth, when marvelous changes are taking 
place in the brain and all the functions of the 
body. Even the purest, cleanest boys in the 
world are liable to be affected in the way de- 
scribed when the physical and mental develop- 
ments in every part of the system are so tre- 
mendous. 

Of course the quacks do not confine them- 
selves to enumerating such simple and general 
symptoms of puberty as these. They know 
very well that there is a close connection be- 
tween the sexual functions and the brain, so 
that, whenever there is any trouble with the 
sexual life, the brain is seriously affected, and 
this very fact gives them a double hold upon 
young minds. They know how to picture in 
their damnable literature the fatal results of 
youthful abuse and sexual indiscretions and 



218 The Crime of Silence 

sins. Consequently, those who have any mis- 
givings in regard to themselves fall easy victims 
to their nefarious appeals. 

I have known boys in schools and colleges to 
be so terrified with fear that they might be sex- 
ually ruined that they have not been able to 
concentrate their minds, have fallen behind in 
their classes, and in many instances have been 
obliged to drop their studies and go home. 
Some youths^ even become insane, and their 
parents have thought all along that the whole 
trouble was due to overwork or ordinary phys- 
ical ailments. 

I wish it were possible to reach every youth 
in the land to bid them beware of the authors 
and purveyors of such literature. 

They are not in the business for the good of 
your health, my young friends, but for the 
good of their own pocketbooks. Their liter- 
ature is designed to make you think that they 
are extremely anxious to help you, — that 
they want to save you from self-destruction. 
They are well aware how sensitive you are 
about this subject, and how your fears are 
aroused, even if there has been in your con- 
duct not the least cause for worry. But they 



Quacks and ''Lost Manhood" 219 

know that, if you have the remotest suspicion 
that anything is wrong with you, you will be 
an easy victim to their insinuating appeals. 
They know very well that, by hook or by crook, 
you are going to get the money to consult them 
and to buy their quack remedies. No reputa- 
ble physician would for a moment endorse these 
remedies; he knows that there is absolutely no 
curative virtue in them. These vile advertis- 
ers have no secret, no knowledge, no drug, no 
remedy of the smallest value to give to young 
men in exchange for their money. 

In their advertisements we often see the 
photograph of an elderly man with a long 
beard and a benign face, who is described as 
the guardian angel who presides over an insti- 
tution founded to save boys 'Vho have made 
mistakes." As a matter of fact, the actual 
man who presides over the institution has no 
venerable beard whatever, but has a black- 
guard's face, a face so repulsive for its animal- 
ism and greed that to publish it in his advertise- 
ment would be to drive away patrons. I knew 
one of the meanest, crudest, most grasping and 
conscienceless men in Chicago who went by the 
name of old Dr. Blank, who was supposed to 



220 The Crime or Silence 

be one of these sages who save multitudes of 
youths from destruction. Such men as he and 
their institutions are the vilest frauds. Quacks 
of this kind should be prohibited by law from 
practicing their nefarious trade, and their ad- 
vertisements should be banished from public 
prints. 

If you have been so unfortunate, either 
through ignorance or otherwise, as to violate 
the sexual instinct, the first thing to do in or- 
der to retrieve your error is to get your mind 
normal, to get rid of the idea that you are in a 
hopeless condition, that you are going to the 
dogs, that you will inevitably become emas- 
culated physically, mentally, and morally. 
Above all other things, never resort to any ad- 
vertised drugs or remedies, never read any 
quack advertisements or literature. They will 
only poison your mind, and their authors will 
rob you of every cent you have. 

Why, only a little while ago I knew of a 
poor boy who spent nearly all the money he had 
for a marvelous electric belt which was going 
to restore his ''lost manhood" and cure him of 
all evil tendencies. Of course this did him no 
good whatever. He was simply throwing his 



Quacks and ''Lost Manhood'' 221 

money away. He told me that he afterwards 
spent hundreds of dollars in all sorts of ad- 
vertised medicines, appliances and devices, and 
received absolutely no help from any of them. 
Finally, he met and fell in love with a beauti- 
ful, pure girl, and through association with her 
was restored to his normal condition. He was 
cured of his obsession, married the girl whose 
influences had saved his life from wreckage, 
and is now happy. 

Now, my suffering young friend, wherever 
you may be, remember that, whatever the de- 
gree of your sexual sin, you are probably ex- 
aggerating your condition. Your mind is not 
normal, and you are, possibly, so obsessed with 
the hopelessness of your case that, if at school 
or college, you may not be able to concentrate 
your attention upon your studies; or, if at 
work, whether of a mental or physical charac- 
ter, you may find yourself unable to focus your 
power and do it intelligently. The most fear- 
ful obsessions I have ever known have been 
developed by splendid youths who have, per- 
haps in moments of supreme temptation, gone 
wrong, or who have ignorantly, without any 
knowledge of the hideousness of their error, 



222 The Crime or Silence 

fallen into secret practices which have had a 
fearful effect upon their minds. When they 
realized the awful seriousness of sexual sin, 
they completely lost heart, thought there was 
no hope of recovering themselves, and went 
down to utter degradation and ruin. 

There is no evil so bad that it can not be 
ameliorated, and the very fact that there is a 
strong probability that you are greatly exag- 
gerating the desperateness of your situation 
should give you confidence to help yourself. 
Specific suggestions for self-cure treatment are 
given in the next chapter. 

The first thing for you to do, however, is to 
resolve firmly to conquer yourself, to be a man, 
and to break away from whatever evil habit 
holds you down. Keep your mind as sanely 
and wholesomely occupied as possible, and ab- 
solutely free from sexual matters. Read pure, 
wholesome, inspiring literature that will flood 
your mind with lofty thoughts and ideals. 
This will be an antidote to your worst enemies, 
sensual thought, sensual imaginings, and vi- 
cious associations. The purer your thought, 
the quicker and the more certain your complete 
recovery. 



Quacks and "Lost Manhood" 223 

Do not allow yourself to talk about sexual 
matters; do not listen to impure stories, or 
covert allusions to subjects that should be held 
sacred. Associate only with pure-minded peo- 
ple. Keep much with your sisters and your 
mother, and, if you have a sweetheart, asso- 
ciate as much as possible with her. The com- 
panionship of pure women will be one of your 
greatest helps in recovering yourself. It will 
make you ashamed that you ever had even an 
impure thought. 

Remember always that purity is power, crea- 
tive energy, efficiency, happiness. It must be 
the very basis of your ideal of marriage and of 
a home. Remember, also, that you owe it to 
the girl of your dreams, the girl you hope to 
marry, to keep your mind, your physical life, 
just as pure and clean as you expect her to be 
when you lead her to the altar. 

The whole secret of your recovery is not in 
quack drugs or remedies, but in yourself, your 
mental attitude, your determination to be true 
to your best self, to live up to the highest and 
noblest ideal of manhood which is possible for 
every normal youth. 

When you get a glimpse of the divine within 



224 The Crime or Silence 

you and experience its uplifting power, when 
you learn to trust the God in you for assistance, 
for release from this slavery, you will find your- 
self and this divinity always in the majority. 
Nothing, no evil power, can then stand against 
you. "Chastity enables the soul to breathe a 
pure air in the foulest places." 

On the other hand, there is nothing else 
which so shuts God out of one's life as gross 
impurity. The soul of the confirmed sexual 
pervert ceases to aspire and revels in moral 
filth. Every act of impurity still further ob- 
scures the soul vision. 

We forget too easily the sanctity of life. It 
uplifts a man to feel respect for himself, to feel 
that life proceeds from God, and that it gath- 
ers up in itself all the pain and joy of the past 
and all the hope of the future. When a man 
understands this, he willingly forgoes a fleet- 
ing gratification in order to keep life pure, 
strong, invincible. 

There is a very close connection between a 
fine, strong, clean body and a fine, strong, clean 
character. Very often deterioration of char- 
acter begins with the neglect of the person and 
little details of toilet, of the bath, and the 



Quacks and "Lost Manhood" 225 

grooming of oneself. Absolute cleanliness of 
body assists greatly in the attainment of men- 
tal and moral purity. The consciousness of 
being clean in every particular adds to one's 
self-respect and gives an uplift to the whole 
being, increases ability, clears thought, 
strengthens ambition, stimulates energy and 
vitality. A cold bath every morning, winter 
as well as summer (if you react quickly), is a 
tonic for both body and mind. 

Regular habits, simple fare, plenty of exer- 
cise and sleep, and both in the open air if possi- 
ble, good, wholesome amusements and associat- 
ing with people of high ideals and noble char- 
acter, — all of these are wonderful helps in lead- 
ing a pure, simple life. 

But in this, as in every other form of disease 
or sin, an ounce of prevention is better than a 
pound of cure. You can not tell what may 
come to you in the future, what honor or pro- 
motion ; and you can not afford to take chances 
upon having anything in your past come up to 
embarrass or hold you back. 

There are many men who have been 
raised to positions of honor and public trust 
who would give anything in the world if they 



226 The Crime of Silence 

could blot out some of the unfortunate experi- 
ences of their youth. Things in their earty 
history, which they had forgotten and ncA^er 
expected to hear from again, are raked up 
when they become candidates for office or posi- 
tions of trust. These forgotten bits of imag- 
ined pleasure loom up as insurmountable bars 
across their pathway. 

I know a very rich young man who thought 
he was just having a good time in his youth, — 
sowing his wild oats, — who would give a large 
part of his vast wealth to-day if he could blot 
out a few years of his folly. 

''Young men, keep your record clean!" ex- 
claimed John B. Gough, his last words uttered 
on a platform in Philadelphia, at the very in- 
stant when death laid its finger on his lips, — 
words in which the whole life teaching of the 
eloquent orator are compressed. The young 
man whose record is clean has nothing to fear. 
He can have no better help in making a suc- 
cessful life. Even his physical prowess is de- 
pendent on his purity record. 

The medical directors in our colleges tell us 
that strict continence is absolutely imperative 
to the success of athletes who are training for 



Quacks and "Lost Manhood" 227 

seA^ere contests. It often happens, they say, 
that, when men have unaccountably failed in 
such contests, it is afterwards found that they 
have been violating the laws of chastity and 
thus have devitalized themselves and so sapped 
their stamina and grit that they have been 
easily vanquished by their competitors. 

Physicians know that the retention of the 
sexual fluid makes for mental and physical 
virility, that it is transmuted into brain power, 
into creative force and bodily vigor, and that, 
on the other hand, any drainage of this force 
results in mental and moral as well as physical 
deterioration. Any loss of sexual force, espe- 
cially before a youth attains his growth, starves 
and stunts his physical and mental develop- 
ment. 

Animal breeders understand this principle. 
They know that young animals are stunted and 
never attain their maximum of physical devel- 
opment unless they are carefully guarded from 
a too early drain and loss of sexual force. 
Even untutored savages understand Nature's 
laws and isolate their youths from females un- 
til they have attained their complete physical 
development. 



228 The Crime of Silence 

Purity is best protected by a great life pur- 
pose. A man with such a purpose is shielded 
from a great many temptations which come to 
the aimless. His energy, his surplus vitality, 
goes out in enthusiastic work. 

Constant occupation and pure, high think- 
ing bar the way to impure thoughts and desires. 
It is in the chambers of an idle life that the 
spiders of impurity spin their webs. A thou- 
sand temptations, which never come to a busy 
man, tempt the idle brain to all sorts of mis- 
chief. The whole family of vice dogs the steps 
of the idler. Just as vicious characters gravi- 
tate toward barrooms and haunts of vice, so 
bad things, evil things which arouse the pas- 
sions, gravitate toward an idle brain. As ver- 
min, slime and all other sorts of disgusting 
things collect in a pool whose water has no out- 
let, so all uncleanness finds a resting place in 
a stagnant mind. While the brook was tum- 
bhng down the mountain side it was clear and 
sparkling, but when it reached the valley and 
stopped working, it became the meeting place 
for everything that was vile, disgusting, and 
ugly. The active mind, the man engaged in 
ennobling work, keeps all his faculties clean, 



Quacks and "Lost Manhood'' 229 

strong, and pure, while the idler, the man who 
is not occupied in some useful work deteriorates 
and becomes polluted. Innumerable examples 
of the disintegrating effects of idleness may be 
found among the gilded youth who have no 
other occupation in life than seeking pleasure. 
If you "hitch your wagon to a star" and 
keep constantly working toward your ideal, im- 
purity can not get hold of you. Nothing will 
tempt you to the misuse or abuse of the most 
sacred instinct of your being, the sex instinct, 
the preserving of which in its integrity, in its 
absolute purity, will alone bring you the great- 
est happiness and make possible the highest 
efficiency. Your record will be as clean as that 
of the Duke of Wellington, of whom Tenny- 
son in his funeral ode, when England was 
mourning her great hero, said — 

Whatever record leap to light. 
He never shall be shamed. 



CHAPTER XIII 

HOW. TO REGAIN YOUR MANHOOD 

Virtue is not left to stand alone. He who practices it will 
have neighbors. — Confucius. 

Or, if Virtue feeble were, 
Heaven itself would stoop to her. 

— John Milton. 

On the 22d of September, 1862, when he had 
resolved upon the Emancipation Proclamation, 
President Lincoln entered this solemn vow in 
his diary: ^'I have promised my God that I 
will do it." 

That was the first step toward the issuance 
of that epoch-making proclamation which gave 
liberty to an enslaved race. 

If you are enslaved by vile, impure habits 
your first step toward freedom is to promise 
your God and yourself that you will be free. 
Seal your promise as Lincoln did his by writing 
it in your diary. Emphasize your decision by 
constantly repeating it to yourself, or when 
alone, audibly. The audible self-cure treat- 

230 



How TO Regain Your Manhood 231 

ment may be used with marvelous results in 
correcting any unfortunate habit- 
In a boys' club in one of our large cities the 
boys have a self-conducted court in which 
they affix penalties for the offending members. 
This is one of the penalties: A boy who has 
been reported as using profane language is 
obliged to write two hundred times the sen- 
tence, "What a foolish habit this is!" After 
he has been through this experience a few 
times he begins to realize that the habit is a 
pretty foolish one. 

If you have smirched your ideals and de- 
graded yourself by vicious habits of self-in- 
dulgence, the practice of impurity, whether 
physically or through a debauched imagination, 
there is no better way to break these habits, 
to overcome this practice, than by giving your- 
self mental and oral, not written, purity treat- 
ments, especially before retiring at night. 
Talk to yourself something after this manner : 
'T know this vicious habit is destroying my 
vitality; I am not so vigorous, so virile, as 
I was before. My brain is not so creative. I 
am not so robust physically or mentally. 
I do not think so clearly because my brain has 



232 The Crime of Silence 

become muddled. I can not concentrate or 
control my mind as I once could. I go all to 
pieces over little annoyances which once did not 
trouble me. 

"This demoralizing habit is placing me at a 
great disadvantage in life. It is holding me 
down when I ought to be forging ahead. I 
know that I have more abihty than many of 
those about me, who are accomplishing a great 
deal more than I. Now, I am going to con- 
quer this thing which is destroying my vital- 
ity, sapping my life, and ruining my prospects. 
I am going to free myself from it, to recover 
my self-respect, my manhood, at any cost. I 
am going to be a MAN, not a THING." 

Keep your freedom from the enslaving habit 
constantly fixed in your mind, and continually 
strengthen your power to overcome by auto- 
suggestion of hatred of it and the reiterated 
resolution to fight it to the death. 

Flood your mind with thoughts and affirma- 
tions which will antidote your sensual desires. 
Look out for the subtle persuasions of appetite. 
Repeat again and again your determination 
not to allow your life to be spoiled by unre- 
strained passion. Make your denial of its 



How TO Regain Your Manhood 233 

power over you so strong and vigorous that it 
will help kill your desire. Whenever you are 
assailed by temptation say: 

"It is unmanly to yield to this temptation 
which is debasing my whole being. No mat- 
ter if others do tell me that, in order to be a 
good fellow, to be a sport, to be a 'thorough- 
bred,' I must do what the other boys do, must 
know the world, and must sow my wild oats, 
I know it can not be right to do that which 
makes me hate myself. I am certain that the 
Creator never made that necessary to my health 
or my growth which makes me despise myself. 
I can not afford to indulge in habits which 
make me ashamed to look myself in the face, 
which make me blush to meet others. 

''I know very well that I radiate what is in 
my mind, that I shall give the impression of my 
uncleanness, for whatever is uppermost in our 
thoughts we are constantly giving out to other 
minds. If I indulge in this habit others will 
see the results of it in my face and I shall not 
be able to look them in the eye. I am only 
too conscious of having violated the most sacred 
thing in me, and I shall radiate this conscious- 
ness to others," 



234 The Crime of Silence 

You must replace the impure imaginings in 
which you have hitherto indulged by their op- 
posites, by pictures of things that are pure, up- 
lifting, clean, healthy. You must clean up 
your mind before you can clean up your mor- 
als. Mental hygiene is the great remedy, the 
healing balm for all immoral wounds. If the 
mind is kept clean the body will follow suit. 
Pure mind, pure imagination, pure body. 

In cautioning youth against that impure 
visualizing which bewitches and corrupts, 
Henry Ward Beecher said, ''I solemnly warn 
you against indulging in morbid imagination. 
In that busy and mischievous faculty begins the 
evil." 

No one can indulge safely thoughts, sugges- 
tions or emotions he would not act out in real- 
ity without shame or fear. Thousands of the 
inmates of our penitentiaries began their down- 
ward career by imagining criminal procedure; 
visualizing, innocently perhaps at first, the act 
of entering a house at night and burglarizing 
it. Repeating the criminal thought, the crimi- 
nal picture, led to the criminal act. 

The first sin of the sexual pervert was one of 
thought, of immoral visualizing, until the im- 



How TO Regain Your Manhood 235 

moral thought habit was formed and the acts 
followed. He must regain his manhood 
through the same medium — the mind. 

As Dr. Quackenbos, the famous hypnotic 
physician who has had remarkable success in 
helping sexual perverts to reform, says, it is 
the continued and unfailing radiation of health- 
ful and uplifting ideas, the holding such ideas 
constantly in mind, perpetually keeping the 
mind away from debasing thoughts, these are 
the potent helps to reform. 

Mental hygiene must precede physical hy- 
giene. The mind must be sustained and 
strengthened by the frequent renewal of your 
solemn promise henceforth to keep yourself 
pure. You may vary the words you use, but 
let your purpose be unchanging, inviolable 
from the start. Think of the pure good women 
you know, and say: 

"I hereby promise my God to do nothing 

, which will make me think less of myself, which 

will mar or lower my ideal of womanhood. I 

I despise the thing which keeps me back in life, 
which tends to make me a failure, or anything 
less than a man. I will not take the risk of in- 
r """""" 



236 The Crime of Silence 

something will help me to break the habit later. 
I know that further indulgence will only bind 
me more strongly to it, and make my ultimate 
chances of breaking away from it less and less." 

One great trouble with the curing of vicious 
habits is that many people resolve to quit for 
a certain time. This is fatal. There is only 
one way to kill a vicious habit, and that is to 
strangle it by cutting off the food which nour- 
ishes it. 

To release ourselves from the power of a 
long-continued habit, and to form a new one, 
Professor James said: — "We must take care 
to wrench ourselves with as strong and decided 
initiative as possible. We must accumulate all 
the possible circumstances which shall reinforce 
the right motive. We must put ourselves as- 
siduously in positions which encourage the new 
way. We must make engagements incom- 
patible with the old. We must develop our 
resolution with every aid we know. This will 
give our new beginnings such a momentum that 
the temptation to break down will not occur as 
soon as it might, and every day during which 
a breakdown is postponed adds to the chances 
that it will not occur at all. We must, how- 



How TO Regain Your Manhood 237 

ever, never suffer an exception to occur until 
the new habit is securely rooted in life. Each 
lapse is like letting fall a ball of string which 
one is carefully winding up — a single slip un- 
does more than a great many turns will wind 
again." 

There is no such thing as breaking away 
gradually from the vice of impurity or any 
other sin. Dallying with it only gives it a 
firmer hold on you. 

John B. Gough was a brilhant young man. 
He knew that he had a better use for his brain 
than to destroy it with alcohol, but he prided 
himself upon being able to control his appetite 
at any time. With the arrogance of self-con- 
fident youth he said to himself: ^'John, you 
are strong enough to stop this drink business 
whenever you wish to." But before he real- 
ized it he found that the tiny wires of habit 
which could have been severed so easily in the 
early stages had gradually twisted into a pow- 
erful cable which held him in a grip of iron. 
He found himself a slave where he thought 
he was master. He knew that if he did not 
put forth a mighty effort to break the chain 
that bound him he would never regain his lost 



238 The Crime of Silence 

manhood. So one night at a temperance meet- 
ing, with hand which shook so that he could 
hardly write his name, he signed fh^ pledge. 

Then began a fearful struggle for mastery. 
For days and nights, without a mouthful of 
food, and with almost no sleep, he wrestled 
with the demon which was trying to overpower 
him. For a whole week he continued to fight 
that fearful battle with appetite until he 
conquered. Then weak, faint, almost dying, 
he crawled into the sunlight, victorious. The 
man had conquered the demon which had al- 
most slain him. 

After this triumph over the forces of evil 
the possibilities which had failed Mr. Gough 
in early life began to come back. Little by 
little he got possession of the great life assets 
which had slipped away from him while his 
brain was anaesthetized by alcohol. Bit by bit 
his capital of manhood came back until he had 
not only re-estabhshed himself in the estima- 
tion of those who knew him, but became a tre- 
mendous power for good. 

Once you have put your hand to the plough 
don't allow yourself to look back, and above 
all, no matter how hard the battle goes, don't 



How TO Regain Your Manhood 239 

succumb to discouragement. It is not an easy 
matter to overcome a vile habit, but the power 
of divinity within you is greater than that of 
any evil passion or practice, however strong. 

When Washington was officially notified of 
his nomination for the Presidency he was com- 
pletely overcome, so little did he realize his 
own greatness, his ability to fill such a high 
office. He felt that there was no one in the 
room who was less fitted for such a high posi- 
tion or less worthy of so great an honor. He 
had little idea of the latent forces and com- 
manding qualities which the next two years 
would call out of his nature. 

Most of us do not half realize our latent 
strength because we do not exert it. We do 
not make a loud enough call upon the Great 
Within of us, our higher, more potent selves. 

"Affirm that which you wish, and it will be 
manifest in your life." Affirm it confidently, 
with the utmost faith, without any doubt of 
what you affirm. Force your mind toward 
your goal; hold it there steadily, persistently, 
for this is the mental condition that achieves, 
that conquers all obstacles, overcomes all 
temptations. 



240 The Crime of Silence 

The objective side of man has a wonderful 
power to inspire and to encourage the subjec- 
tive side; to arouse the subconscious mental- 
ity where all latent power and possibilities lie. 
Deep within man dwell slumbering powers that 
would revolutionize his life if aroused and put 
into action. 

The habit of claiming as our own, as a vivid 
reality, that which we desire, has a tremendous 
magnetic force in drawing those subconscious 
powers to our aid. Affirmation is creative. 
The constant vigorous assertion: "I am purity; 
I am health; I am vigor; I am power; I am 
principle; I am truth; I am justice; I am 
beauty; because made in the image of perfec- 
tion, of harmony, of truth, of justice, of im- 
mortal beauty" — tends to the manifestation of 
these things in our lives. 

Few people realize the tremendous creative 
power there is in stout self-assertion: in the 
vigorous affirmation of the divine power of the 
ego, the ''I," the "I am." But those who have 
once properly put it in practice never again 
doubt its efficacy. 

After he had conquered the alcohol habit 



How TO Regain Your Manhood 241 

and had become the most powerful temperance 
lectm'er in this country, Gough used to describe 
the struggles of a friend in his effort to break 
away from smoking, over-indulgence in which 
had shattered his health. The man threw 
away all his pipes, everything which had any- 
thing to do with tobacco, and said that was the 
end of the whole business. But it was only the 
beginning of greater suffering than he had so 
far endured. His craving for ''just one 
smoke" was so great that he would chew camo- 
mile, gentian, even tooth picks, to deaden the 
desperate physical gnawing of his desire. In 
a moment of weakness he bought a plug of 
tobacco and put it into his pocket, not to chew, 
but ''for company." The temptation was too 
great and he took the plug out of his pocket 
determined to stop his agony by one chew. 
But before putting it into his mouth, some di- 
vine impulse stirred within him, and he looked 
at it for a moment. Then his manhood came 
to his assistance, and throwing the tobacco 
from him he cried, "You are a weed, I am a 
man. I will master you if I die for it!" He 
did master it by continually asserting his man- 



242 The Crime of Silence 



hood, his power over the thmg that was injur- 
ing him, ''I am a man. I will master you if 
I die for it." 

Audible self-suggestion, which is merely a 
continuation or extension of the affirmation 
principle, is one of the greatest aids to self- 
control. We all know how a resolution is 
strengthened by the spoken declaration to put 
it into effect. 

There is a force in words spoken aloud which 
is not stirred by going over the same words 
mentally. They make a more lasting impres- 
sion upon the mind — just as words which pass 
through the eye from the printed page make 
a greater impression on the brain than we get 
by thinking the same words; as seeing objects 
of nature makes a more lasting impression 
upon the mind than thinking about them. If 
you repeat to yourself aloud, vigorously, even 
vehemently, a firm resolve, you are more likely 
to carry it to reality than if you merely resolve 
in silence. 

There must be no shilly-shallying weakness 
either in your resolutions or affirmations con- 
cerning the loathsome vice of impurity. You 
must be very positive in your affirmation of 



How TO Regain Your Manhood 243 

power to overcome your dangerous habit. If 
you simply say to yourself, ''I know that this 
thing is bad for me; I know that if I con- 
tinue its practice, it will interfere with my suc- 
cess and destroy my health and happiness, but 
I fear I shall never be able to overcome it; I 
know it will be a fearful struggle, because it 
has such a terrible grip on me," you will never 
make any headway. 

Always stoutly assert your ability to con- 
quer. Say to yourself, with the utmost convic- 
tion, ''I was not made to be dominated by such 
a vice. God's image in me was not intended 
to wallow in this filth. I can never use my 
ability to the best advantage if I continue in it. 
I shall never be the man my Creator intended 
me to be, that I am capable of being, while I 
harbor this secret enemy which will sap my 
force, waste my vitality, and weaken my 
chances of success in life. It is making struc- 
tural changes in my body, destroying my abil- 
ity to think, blurring mj^ moral sensibilities. 
I am done with it at once and forever. The 
appetite for it is destroyed. There is some- 
thing divine within me, the God man, the 
stamp of my Creator, that which makes me per- 



244 The Crime of Silence 

f ectly well able to overcome this thing, which 
is not of God, but of the devil." 

The trouble with most people in trying to 
overcome evil habits or to create good ones is 
that they do not use half their will power, or, 
what is even stronger, their power of convic- 
tion which can be greatly increased and inten- 
sified by constant affirmation. Our resolutions 
are weak, wishy-washy. We do not put vim 
enough, grit enough into them. It is only the 
vigorous resolution that conquers. 

When a general burns his bridges behind 
him, cuts off all chances of retreat, he knows 
that his men will, fight with a desperation which 
would not otherwise have been possible. As 
soon as you have seriously committed yourself 
to your resolution and have burned your 
bridges behind you, this very committal will 
call to your aid mighty hidden resources of 
whose very existence you were ignorant. But 
as long as you leave open a way of retreat, and 
think* that perhaps when the temptation be- 
comes too strong you will indulge just a little, 
you will not bring out your greatest resources. 
These only respond to the desperate call, the 
wireless ''S. O, S," of the soul. 



How TO Regain Your Manhood 245 

Have nothing to do with the companions 
that would drag you down. Cut loose from 
everything that suggests, that tempts you to 
indulge in impurity. Get out into the country, 
if you can, into the woods, away from the al- 
lurements of vice. Say to yourself, repeatedly 
and firmly, out loud if you are alone, ''I hereby 
take a sacred oath never to repeat this cursed 
thing. It is an insult to my ideal of woman- 
hood, an insult to my future wife, a crime to 
my unborn children. You are a deadly, 
beastly, degrading, soul-killing, efficiency- 
paralyzing habit; I am a man. Let's have it 
out now once for all. Let's have an under- 
standing with each other right here as to who 
shall dominate this divine human machine — 
my body. There is no chance for both of us in 
this establishment. Either you have got to get 
down off the throne and let me rule, or I shall 
have to quit and turn everything over to you, 
which I shall never do. 

''Now, you vile Thing, you have disgraced 
me for the last time. Never again can you 
humiliate me, make me despise myself. Never 
again can you drag me into the mud and mire 
of beastly indulgence, or make me the slave 



246 The Crime or Silence 

of desire or passion. I am done with you. 
You have had your last grip upon me. 

"There can be only one ruler here; and that 
one is going to be myself. I don't propose to 
allow you to ruin my life, to force me to carry 
in my very face the signs of my weakness, of 
my degradation and the triumph of vice over 
me. You have humiliated, disgraced, and in- 
sulted me long enough by your damnable 
domination, making me admit that I am a no- 
body and that I have lost out in the great race 
for success and happiness, making me acknowl- 
edge that I have* not enough strength of mind 
to stand up against a single, vicious, degrading 
habit. 

"Now, I defy you, and I deny your power 
over me. Hereafter I am going to walk the 
earth as a conqueror, not as conquered; as a 
victor, not as a victim. Hereafter I am not 
going about like a whipped cur. I am going 
to face the world with my head up. Here- 
after I am going to be master here. You have 
gotten hold of the wrong man if you think you 
are going to keep me down any longer. 

''Your chief strength over me in the past 
has come from the law of repetition. Every 



How TO Regain Your Manhood 247 

time I yielded to you made it easier and ever 
easier to yield again. By this same law of 
repetition, through the power of affirmation, I 
will free myself forever from your grip." 

You will be surprised at the uplifting sensa- 
tion, the stimulating thrill, the new sense of 
victory which will come from your first tri- 
umph over your enemy. You may feel weak, 
exhausted physically in the beginning, but you 
will grow stronger daily. Those verbal heart 
to heart talks with yourself will give you new 
courage, new power to overcome. They will 
start a new hope center in your life and sus- 

' tain you in the battle. By the constant repe- 
tition of victory over j^our lower nature you 

jL will in time gain complete self-mastery. 

'^ Another thing of the utmost importance is 
to have your mind in good condition when you 
retire. Prepare your mind for sleep with a 
mentaLbath, excluding from it every vicious 
thought, all unholy visualizing. Be careful 
what you see at night. Do not go to exciting 

J or questionable amusements, for whatever dis- 
turbs your sleep will aggravate your trouble. 
Put yourself in a worshipful attitude. The 
mind adapts itself to the body's position. The 



248 The Crime of Silence 



assuming of an attitude of reverence and de- 
votion toward your Creator, the lifting of the 
ideals, by dwelling upon pure, clean thoughts 
before composing yourself to sleep, will be a 
tremendous help in restoring you to health and 
purity. 

It is a terrible thing to be a slave to any 
weakness or vice which saps our energies, 
dwarfs our efforts and lessens or ruins our 
chances in life. But these things are only as 
strong, only as real as we ourselves allow them 
to be. The most degrading habit can be 
broken link by link as it was forged link by 
link. 

It is holding the thought that you can not 
break away from the degrading habit you have 
contracted that gives it power over you. That 
power would instantly be broken if you be- 
lieved, and asserted your belief in your own 
power to break away from it. But as long 
as you believe you are a hopeless victim of the 
habit that enslaves you you will be. When 
you begin to affirm that you are free ; that you 
are no longer the slave of vice, you have al- 
ready written your Emancipation Proclama- 
tion. 



How TO Regain Your Manhood 249 

Vice repeated is like the wandering wind. 
Blows dust in others' eyes, to spread itself. 

— Shakespeare. 

Virtue alone outbuilds the pyramids; 

Her monuments shall last, when Egypt's fall. 

— Edward Young. 

So dear to heaven is saintly chastity 
That, when a soul is found sincerely so, 
A thousand liveried angels lackey her, 
Driving far oflf each thing of sin and guilt. 

— ^JoHN Milton. 



Note. — The subject of health in general, including in particular a 
description of the proper measures to be taken for the recovery of 
vigorous manhood, is in itself an extensive one — too extensive to be 
discussed in this volume. 

When youthful errors have undermined the physical powers, one is 
face to face with problems that are ofttimes serious. But we have the 
assurance of specialists in the field of sex hygiene that once injurious 
habits are absolutely discontinued, their effects may in every case be 
overcome by proper physical upbuilding and the attainment of a sane 
and normal mental attitude. 

Those who seek full and complete information on the anatomy of 
the human body, and also in regard to the hygienic measures — diet, 
exercise, bathing, etc., best adapted to counteract physical shortcomings 
of every sort, cannot do better than to obtain from the publishers of 
the present work the five volumes of "Macfadden's Encyclopedia of 
Physical Culture." These volumes present in complete form, for ready 
reference, information on every aspect of body-building. Attention is 
directed to the descriptive notice following the conclusion of this book. 



CHAPTER XIV 

WHY THE ''unfortunate WOMAN" 

'Tis a "glorious" prowess, forsooth, with a word. 

To wound the trusting and tame the proud. 
E'en as a leaf by a breath is stirred, 

A spray by a dewdrop bowed; 
And so the battle goes bravely on. 

And hearts get hardened as tongues flow free, 
And swells the blazon, "I conquer you. 

Lest you should conquer me." 

When the rose of thine own being 

Shall reveal its central fold. 
Thou shalt look within and marvel. 

Fearing what thine eyes behold: 
What it shows and what it teaches 

Are not things wherewith to part; 
Thorny rose ! that always costeth 

Beatings at the heart. — Jean Ingelow. 

Nearly half a century ago a boy of nineteen, 
whose parents were in moderate circumstances, 
went to a large city at a distance to take an ad- 
vanced course of study. To eke out the small 
allowance his father could afford, he did jani- 
tor work, put on plastering laths by the thou- 

250 



Why the ''Unfortunate Woman" 251 

sand, japanned metal castings by piece work, 
and drifted into canvassing for books under a 
general agent who trained him and under 
whose tutelage he soon became very successful, 
taking up a new book when his territory had 
been covered for the one in hand in its turn. 
At length he took up two companion books by 
Dr. George H. Napheys, "The Transmission 
of Life," for men, and ''The Physical Life of 
Woman," for women. They were very good 
books, giving information every one should pos- 
sess on matters of sex and sexual hygiene ; and, 
as they were of interest, or should be, to all, 
the agent directed that the ground should be 
covered without skipping a house, as had been 
done with other books of interest only to spe- 
cial classes. 

In one house the canvasser sold one of the 
women's books to a young woman who seemed 
much interested in it and questioned him very 
earnestly about it before purchasing, and who 
then asked him to wait a moment until she 
could call in some friends and di-aw their atten- 
tion to the book,- — as the young man, contrary 
to his usual custom, carried a supply of books 
for immediate dehvery with him. She soon 



252 The Crime or Silence 

returned, accompanied by half a dozen young 
women^friends, each of whom, by her advice, 
bought a book. They all seemed to be simi- 
larly interested, and gave him the names and 
addresses of friends to whom they wished him 
to present the merits of the volume. He had 
not called upon more than one or two of these 
friends before it suddenly dawned upon him 
that there was something queer about the whole 
matter; and, on inquiry, he learned what he 
had at first not so much as suspected, — he had 

stumbled into a house of ill fame at first, and 

f — — — — - ■ — ^ 

had been sent to otherJiQiises of the same kind. 
But what impressed him most was that every 
inmate, or nearly every one, bought a book, 
one of the most moral and plain-spoken ever 
published. 

Naturally, because of the sales, he made the 
rounds of all but the lowest brothels in the city, 
and sold many books. But what astonished 
him most— deeply impressed him, in fact, — 
was that not once, in all this round, was he him- 
self canvassed for immo ral purpose s. Indeed, 
although some of the women he met were igno- 
rant and somewhat slangy of speech, not one 
made a remark or even a suggestion which 



Why the "Unfortunate Woman" 253 

would be considere d impr oper in any company. 
The earnestness and bearing of the boy no 
doubt had something to do with this, but it was 
almost painfully evident that the women were 
very seriously, were even sadly interested in 
the subject matter of the book, and were im- 
bued with a sort of missionary spirit that led 
them to wish to extend its aid and counsel to 
as many of their unfortunate class as possi- 
ble. 

The boy, grown to manhood, has been solic- 
ited many times in large cities by ''women in 
scarlet," but never with any licentious temp- 
tation whatever. Instead, in such instances, 
he has always pitied the poor creatures, and he 
has never forgotten the glimpse he got, in can- 
vassing, of traces of their better nature which 
still survived their fall even in world-con-, 
demned and pariahed prostitutes. 

He has since married and reared a large fam- 
ily of children. Influenced by what he learned 
while canvassing, he has had repeated, careful, 
sympathetic talks with his boys, beginning 
when each was sice years old, and has persuaded 
his wife to have similar talks with the girls. 
All the children are leading moral lives, and 



254 The Crime of Silence 

not even a rumor of anything else has stained 
the hfe of any of them. 

In answer to a question as to whether the 
'unfortunate woman" is a victim or a contribu- 
tor to her own vicious career, John D. Rocke- 
feller, Jr., founder of the Bureau of Social Hy- 
giene in New York City, replied : "I say un- 
hesitatingly that in the vast majority of cases 
she is a victim. Prostitution, as now con- 
ducted in this country and in Europe, is very 
largely a man's business ; the women are merely 
tools in the hands of the stronger sex. It is a 
business run for profit, and the profit is large. 

''It is my belief that less than twenty-five 
per cent, of the prostitutes in this city would 
have fallen if they had had an equally good 
chance to lead a pure life. That they have 
been dragged into the mire in such large num- 
bers is due to a variety of circumstances, among 
which are poverty, low wages, improper home 
conditions and lack of training, the desire to 
gratify the natural craving for amusement, 
pretty things, etc. ; but, while all of these and 
many others may be contributory causes, man 
is chiefly responsible for their fall." 

This statement of Mr. Rockefeller is 



Why the ''Unfoetunate Woman" 255 

supported by Lieutenant-Govern or Wagn er, 
chairman of the State Factory Investigation 
Commission of New York. Speaking of a re- 
cent report of the Commission, he said :■ — 

"Women lose what is best and most sacred to 
womanhood because of starvati on wa ges paid 
in some greater New York industries. Start- 
ling conditions have been disclosed. We have 
found that thousands of women receive less 
than six dollars a week, and in many instances 
as low as four and one-half and five^ollars a 
week. 

''How do these women live? We know that 
they cannot live on these low wages. They 
cannot secure even the barest necessities of life, 
much less help maintain a family, as some of 
them have to do. 

''Who pays this difference? 

"That is the serious problem that confronts 
us. Many of these women literally starve. In 
other cases there is a loss of health, a physical 
and mental breakdown, and the worker be- 
comes a charge upon the people. In still other 
cases some of these unfortunate women are 
rendered an easy prey to the basest tempta- 
tions, particularly in the larger cities." 



256 The Crime or Silence 

The detectives of the Juvenile Protective 
Association in Chicago recently arrested and 
convicted seventeen men and three women who 
were plying their miserable trade in the rest 
room of one of the big stores. They were 
taking advantage of girls waiting to look over 
the ''Help Wanted" advertisements in the 
papers, which they could not afford to buy. 

The department store furnishes fruitful 
grounds for the procurers, both male and fe- 
male; for, while the doors of factories are 
closed to outsiders, the store doors are always 
open to everybody. 

Dapper young slave traders will go into a 
store and make little purchases of the pretty 
girls, often trying to flirt with them, giving 
them little presents and inviting them out for 
the evening; and, the first thing these girls 
know, they are in the procurer's toils. Women 
who keep dives often invite salesgirls to their 
homes. These women usually spend large 
sums for clothing, and they often tell the girls 
behind the counters, especially the attractive 
ones, that they could earn much more money in 
a much easier way than by working so hard in 
the stores 1 



Why the "Unfortunate Woman" 257 

Many salesgirls who wait upon rich cus- 
tomers and who see all sorts of pretty things, 
beautiful dresses and lingerie, which the young 
girls long to possess, piled up about them every- 
where, are constantly placed under fearful 
temptation. Of course a well-trained girl, of 
strong, resolute character, is in no danger of 
succumbing, but when we remember the num- 
bers of naturally weak, ignorant, and wholly 
untrained girls many of whom live in loveless 
homes, often with dissolute parents, we can 
understand their craving for affection and pro- 
tection, and why they are more easily tempted 
by the men who make love to them, and who — 
though of course the girls do not suspect them 
— are all the time trying to betray them, to 
work their ruin. 

Martial music, color, glittering uniforms 
have a strong psychological influence even on 
staid practical people. They stir the blood of 
the young and work them up to a state of ab- 
normal excitement. Most young girls are pe- 
culiarly susceptible to the influence of this 
martial glamour. There is something about a 
military uniform and a soldier's life which fas- 
cinates them. 



258 The Crime of Silence 

Jane Addams says that, during an army en- 
campment near Chicago, a great many girls 
were so fascinated by the presence of the young 
soldiers in the city that they comj pletelv los t 
their ^ head s. An investigation showed that 
some had even climbed out of the windojvs at 
night, after their parents were asleep, and gone_ 
,^ut with these men. One girl was found by 
the agent of a protective society hurrying away 
from the encampment late at night. The 
tears were running down her face, and she 
was sobbing as if her heart would break. She 
was so overwhelmed with her wrong that she 
was totally unconscious of the presence of the 
society agent, who heard her say over and over /r 
to herself: ''O Mother of God, what have ijf 
done! What have I done!" " 

Their natural love of romance, their spirit 
of adventure, their passion for innocent fun 
and play, have been taken advantage of to 
lead many to their ruin. If those traits had 
been directed into wholesome channels in child- 
hood, most of the unfortunate girls, whom the 
world condemns, and upon whom society turns 
its back, could have been saved to lives of use- 
fulness and happiness. 



Why the ''Unfortunate Woman" 259 

Who can estimate the awful human deprav- 
ity, the tragedies, that have resulted from 
young people frequenting cheap theatres, sug- 
gestive picture shows, and other low amuse- 
ment places, with all their demoralizing influ- 
ences? One of the most dangerous elements 
in those places is that they cater so much to 
the animal instincts. In their very advertise- 
ments, they appeal to the sexual instinct. In 
most dance halls, improprieties in the dancing 
and in the association of the sexes are fostered 
and encouraged, aided by the exciting influ- 
ence of drink; the desires are inflamed, and 
means of gratification are even provided. 

The severity and penuriousness of some 
parents who are constantly prodding them to 
earn more money, to increase the family in- 
come, are responsible for the downfall of their 
daughters. The family loyalty to which many 
of these girls have been trained frequently 
leads them to support a father who drinks and 
gambles, even though they are often brutally 
treated if they do not bring home what the 
parents consider sufficient money. 

A well-known sociologist cites a typical ex- 
ample of this kind. A delicate, anemic girl 



260 The Crime of Silence 

who was a dishwasher in a restaurant found 
herself unable to earn what her parents ex- 
pected of her. The long hours of confinement 
and the heavy work were too much for her 
weak frame, and the meagre contents of her 
pay envelope were often further reduced by 
her off-days when ill. Her miserable parents 
not only upbraided her for not earning more, 
but often cuffed and slapped her; and her 
brothers and sisters, who were stronger and 
earned somewhat more than she did, accused 
her of laziness and of not doing her part. 

The girl became so discouraged that when a 
waitress in the restaurant in which she worked 
told her that she could double her money by 
making noon hour appointments in a near-by 
disreputable hotel, she decided to try to earn 
her pay in an ''easier way." It was many 
months after she entered this disreputable 
house before her parents knew of the change, 
as she continued to bring her money home 
regularly every week. 

Years after the death of the ignorant mother, 
who had abused her for her meagre earnings, 
the unfortunate girl referred to her with the 
hope that ''the old lady is now suffering the 



Why the ''Unfortunate Woman" 261 

torments of the lost for making me what I 
am!" 

Of course, girls of this class who have not 
been properly trained do not fully realize the 
moral iniquity of their conduct or its awful con- 
sequences. They only see the contrast between 
the tempting picture put before them — the 
large pay, the beautiful clothes and exciting 
experiences of the evil life, — and their own 
poor, meagre earnings, shabby clothes, and 
monotonous existence. The stories of the 
large amounts of money which others make in 
their illicit trade are fearfully tempting to 
weak-minded girls who have such a hard time 
to make a decent living, to clothe themselves 
respectably, and in many instances to give a 
large part of their salary for the support of 
their families. 

It is true that a girl's virtue should be dearer 
to her than life itself, and that the very thought 
of selling it for material things — for anything 
whatever, — should fill her with horror ; but, in 
any consideration of this question, we must 
not forget the ignorance, the lack of training, 
the environment and home conditions in such 
ca^es as those of the little dishwasher, and the 



262 The Crime of Silence 

constant temptations and evil allurements with 
which those unfortunate girls who are led 
astray are usually surrounded. 

The flourishing condition of commercialized 
vice is very largely a result of poverty, of dis- 
couragement, of desperation. Tens of thou- 
sands of business men in this country, even in 
comfortable circumstances, are perpetually 
haunted by the fear that they may not be able 
to support their families and that they will be 
disgraced by failure. How many men become 
discouraged when they are out of work for a 
time and commit suicide to put an end to their 
troubles ! 

What shall we say, then, of the multitudes 
of girls who can barely earn enough to keep 
them alive, even in their healthiest, most at- 
tractive years? What shall we say of the 
temptations that beset them on every hand? 
Is it any wonder that the spectre of poverty 
demoralizes the minds of some of them and that 
they become easy victims of the tempter? 

Is it any wonder that the inexperienced girl 
who perhaps does not know where her next 
meal is coming from should fall an easy prey 
to some man who is a professional expert in 



Why the ''Unfortunate Woman" 263 

undermining a girl's virtue, expert in vicious 
diplomacy, in suggestion, in hypnotism, expert 
in taking advantage of the very virtue of the 
girl, her longings for a home of her own, her 
yearning for the food of starved affections, her 
longing for somebody to love her? 

Just imagine the temptation of a man who 
is struggling against a great passion for drink, 
trying his best to live a temperate life when his 
indomitable appetite is clamoring for satisfac- 
tion! Imagine this man's plight when his 
companions pull him into a barroom where 
everybody is drinking, hilarious and exuberant, 
and where he is insistently urged to join the 
rest, — what would be the probabilities of his re- 
sisting? 

The poor girl who is solicited by the white 
slave procurer is equally tempted. He ap- 
peals to her longing for a home, her yearning 
for love. Perhaps her life has been barren 
of social opportunities, barren of friendship, 
barren of love, and this tempter holds out all 
sorts of inducements to her. He pretends to 
love her; he tells her he wants to marry her, 
that she is the girl of all girls he has ever met 
who understands him. She is bombarded with 



264 The Crime of Silence 

all sorts of suggestions and temptations. Is it 
any wonder that in a moment of weakness, and 
perhaps when she is weary, she accepts a drink 
to brace her up, not realizing that this will re- 
lax her moral sensibilities, and that she has 
already unlocked the door which her betrayer 
will never again let her lock? 

Poverty and desperation and betrayal 
largely explain why so many delinquent girls 
and deserted women enter the underworld. 
Many a girl has explained her yielding to 
temptation and an evil life by saying that in a 
moment of utter weariness and discouragement 
she "went out with a man." 

They are not the most robust kind, it is 
true, but it is well known that ''morals fluctu- 
ate with trade." In hard times, when business 
is poor, during the dull season, and especially 
in periods of great commer<!ial depression, the 
evil resorts have a great influx of recruits. 

In investigations conducted by the various 
girls' protective associations, many instances 
have been found where girls had gone hungry 
for months, because they could not earn enough 
to pay their room rent, their laundry bills, and 
the price of their meals, before they succumbed 



Why the ''Unfortunate Woman" 265 

to temptation. They had given in only after 
suffering untold tortures, through fear of star- 
vation, and because their pride kept them from 
appealing to charity. 

Many girls are led into earning money in 
questionable ways because of their pride, a 
pitiably false pride to be sure. They can not 
keep up appearances; they can not pay for 
their room or board; their landlady presses 
them, and then there are the appealing letters 
from home for help, — all these things, which 
the great world outside knows nothing of, are 
at work to undermine self-control and break 
down courage. 

One girl pressed in this way explained to 
those who were trying to rescue her that she 
''had sold out for a pair of shoes"! This un- 
fortunate finally yielded to the temptation to 
earn money in an illicit way after she had 
been trying in vain for seven months to save 
money to buy a pair of shoes. She paid three 
dollars a week for board, sixty cents for car- 
fare, and had only forty cents a week left for 
all other expenses out of her four-dollar salary ! 
It was impossible to buy the shoes. 

The fearful struggle for a livelihood, the 



266 The Crime of Silence 

false standards of living in this country, and 
the terrible strain to keep up appearances are 
responsible for the downfall of tens of thou- 
sands of unfortunate girls, who, in their dis- 
tressing poverty, see the evidences of wealth 
and luxurious living flaunted in their faces 
wherever they go. When we add to this the 
damnable wiles of the procurers, who are al- 
ways on the lookout for girls who are discour- 
aged and distressed, it is not strange that so 
many of them are dragged into the underworld. 

The effects of over-strain, over-fatigue, and 
insufficient nourishment tend to undermine 
the moral sensibilities. Think of a girl trying 
to make a living by inserting eyelets in shoes 
at the rate of two cents for a case of twenty- 
four pairs ! Is it any wonder that the powers 
of phj^sical and moral resistance become 
weakened by this perpetual over-strain, over- 
speeding, which is common in every industrial 
line? 

Is it not easy to see how young immigrant 
girls, who are ignorant of our language, our 
usages, our streets, our social customs, often 
become easy victims of evil men who take ad- 
vantage of the great difficulty they have in 



Why the ''Unfortunate Woman" 267 

getting work in our overcrowded industrial 
centres, and who impose on their innocent 
credulousness with all sorts of stories? 

Innumerable causes have been in operation 
to assist the white slavers in their nefarious 
work. Among other things a troubled, un- 
happy mind and mental discord tend to demor- 
alize self-control and lead the weak-willed and 
untrained into wrong paths. A mother's 
death and the breaking up of family ties, the 
coming of a harsh stepmother, discord and dis- 
sipation in the home, — all these things help to 
feed disreputable houses. 

A well-known social worker gives a pathetic 
case of a poor girl whose mother died, and 
whose stepmother would not take her into the 
home. Though only a mere child, she fell a 
victim to a white slave trader who treated her 
with unspeakable cruelty, and she was at last 
found with a bottle of carbolic acid, on the 
point of ending her life and the life of her 
nameless baby. 

It is all very well for people who have plenty 
to eat and comfortable homes to wonder why 
girls should have so little stamina and char- 
acter, and should so easily yield to sin. But 



268 The Crime of Silence 

when a girl's last dollar is gone and she is weary 
with hunting for a situation, when hunger 
stares her in the face, and she is, perhaps, told 
by her lodging mistress that she "cannot stay 
on any longer" ; when she is thrown out on the 
street, and there is not one to take a particle 
of interest in her or to care what becomes of 
her, how can you, who perhaps do not know 
what temptation is, be so pitiless to the girl, 
who, after struggling for a long time, at length 
goes ^vrong? She simply enters the only door 
that opens to her. No other place will take 
her in ; no one else outside of this will give her 
food and shelter. When we remember that the 
strongest of us are to a large extent victims of 
conditions, is it any wonder that a girl in such 
a distressed mental state goes along the line of 
least resistance? Then, when a girl is driven 
to such a place, practically in all cases she looks 
upon it as only a temporary expedient. She 
hopes and expects somehow to redeem her mis- 
take before it becomes known. But it is al- 
ways the old story. It is just like the drunk- 
ard who goes through life always expecting to 
reform. He firmly believes that each debauch 
will be his last ; but he does not realize the iron 



Why the ''Unfortunate Woman" 269 



grip of habit, which fastens tighter and tighter 
upon him, and that each time he indulges he 
makes another indulgence more certain. 

If, instead of building so many libraries and 
endowing so many universities, our Carnegies 
and Rockefellers would build some hotels for 
women, similar to the Mills hotels for men, i 
what a wonderful boon it would be for thou- 
sands of poor girls who come to the cities seek- 
ing positions! 

Contrast the difference in the great city of 
New York, for instance, between the provision 
made for youths by the Young Men's Christian 
Associations and the enormous Mills hotels, 
and the pitiable lack of provision for poor, 
homeless, defenceless girls, who have a thou- 
sand more temptations than men and who are 
not half so able to protect themselves. 

Forty or fifty years ago the white slave traf- 
fic was practically unknown in this country. 
The enormous influx of girls and women into 
the industrial world within this period largely 
explains its introduction among us. To-day 
about si2cty per .cent, of all the young women 
in America are engaged in various occupations, 
— and our present economic system is largely 



270 The Crime or Silence 

responsible for their exploitation for vicious 
purposes. Commercial greed grinds the souls 
of defenceless girls and women into dividends 
and compels them to exist on starvation wages, 
thus exposing them to all sorts of perils and 
temptations. 

Another chief aid to the white slave traffic 
has been the almost criminal custom of bring- 
ing up girls without protecting their future by 
making them self-supporting, without fitting 
them to earn their own living in some practical 
way. 

Parents little realize what a terrible thing it 
is to let girls grow up without learning a t radg 
or occupation by which they can get an inde- 
pendent living or protect their self-respect and 
dignity, and then allow them to drift into the 
city to struggle as best they can for an ex- 
istence. When comparatively few men, even 
those who have had special training, are able 
to get little more than a decent living, and tens 
of thousands fail to do that, what shall we say 
of the chances of the tradeless, occupationless, 
helpless girls who are thrown unprepared into 
the modern maelstrom of strife and selfish 
struggle for bread, for place, and for power ! 



Why the "Unfortunate Woman" 271 

Mothers are often to blame for this. I 
know some of them who would never even let 
their daughters harden or redden their soft 
white hands by washing dishes or doing house- 
wor'k. They would do the drudgery them- 
selves and let their girls sit around and read 
silly novels, because they wanted them to have 
an easier time in life than they had had. Then, 
when these girls grow up untrained, untaught, 
unsophisticated, ignorant of themselves, igno- 
rant of the meaning of their sex; when, per- 
haps, the family meets with reverses, or for 
some reason or other they are forced to find 
a means of livelihood, they naturally drift 
into already overcrowded cities. We should 
not wonder that so many of them fall into sin, 
but rather that the majority of them are saved 
from this terrible fate. 

It is imperatively necessary that all parents, 
whether rich or poor, see that their children, 
and especially their daughters, lear n a jr^de , 
or become sufficiently expert in some occupa- 
tion to enable them to be self-supporting. 
Even the daughters of wealthy parents are not 
secure from sudden changes of fortune, and 
without this safeguard and assurance for her 



272 The Crime of Silence 

future in this age of specialization and fierce 
competition a girl may be tremendously 
tempted to drift into vice. 

It ought to be a misdemeanor punishable by 
law to allow girls to go out into the world to 
earn a living without all the possible safeguards 
which a good education, good moral training, 
and a practical knowledge of some good trade 
or profession can supply. Where parents are 
incompetent or unable to furnish these the 
State should see to it that no girl is obliged to 
face life without being thus prepared and safe- 
guarded. 

"I am no alarmist" is a half-apologetic ex- 
pression often heard in the speech or seen in the 
writings of many who deal with this subject, 
but the writer has no such apology to make. 
As with ''the voice of one crying in the wilder- 
ness," he wishes to warn with the greatest em- 
phasis of which words are capable every one 
under the stress of sexual temptation, but 
whose feet have not yet slipped or have slipped 
but little in its dubious and treacherous paths. 
In dealing with the "white slavery" of the 
twentieth century, he would, if possible, add 
fire and force to the ringing words of James 



Why the "Unfortunate Woman" 273 

Russell Lowell in dealing with the black slav- 
ery of the nineteenth century : 

''In God's name let all who hear, nearer and 
nearer, the hungry moan of the storm and the 
growl of the breakers, speak out! But, alas! 
we have no right to interfere. If a man pluck 
an apple of mine, he shall be in danger of the 
justice; but, if he steal my brother, I must be 
silent. Who says this? Our Constitution, 
consecrated by the callous consuetude of sixty 
years, and grasped in triumphant argument by 
the left hand of him whose right hand clutches 
the clotted slave-whip. Justice, venerable 
with the undethronable majesty of countless 
aeons, says,^ — speak! The Past, wise with the 
sorrows and desolations of ages, from amid her 
shattered fanes and wolf-housing palaces, 
echoes,— speak! Nature, through her thou- 
sand trumpets of freedom, her stars, her sun- 
rises, her seas, her winds, her cataracts, her 
mountains blue with cloudy pines, blows jubi- 
lant encouragement, and cries, — speak! From 
the soul's trembling abysses the still, small 
voice not vaguely murmurs, — speak! But 
alas ! the Constitution and the Honorable Mr. 
Bagowind, M.C., say, — be dumb!" 



274 The Crime of Silence 

But far be it from the author to speak or 
write one word that might add to the woes of 
those whose feet have thus shpped and who are 
now suffering the deplorable consequences. 
Even to the most miserable, the most remorse- 
ful, the most despairing of all such victims, 
''whose eyes fail with wakefulness and tears, 
and ache for the dark house and the long 
sleep," he would most earnestly and reverently 
commend the pitying words of Him of Naz- 
areth, who came to save the lost and who said, 
''Neither do I condemn thee; go, and sin no 
more," — also the words of the Lord of All, as 
quoted by the prophet Isaiah i, 18, "Though 
your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as 
snow; though they be red hke crimson, they 
shall be as wool." 

The night is mother of the day, 

The winter of the spring. 
And ever upon old decay 

The greenest mosses cling; 
Behind the cloud the starlight lurks. 

Through showers the sunbeams fall. 
For God, who loveth all His works, 

Has left His hope with all. — J. G. Whittier. 



CHAPTER XV 

PERILS OF THE NEW FREEDOM 

" It is the little rift within the lute 

That by and by will make the music mute. 

And, ever widening, slowly silence all." 



«1 



'If I had a daughter/' said the late Kyrle 
Bellew to an interviewer, "I wouldn't let her 
get within speaking distance of a matinee 
actor, but I'd let her go to the matinee and fall 
in love with the hero whenever she wanted to. 
Not with the actor, you know, but wit h the pai ±- 
he plays ; that's the difference, and it's a whole 
lot of difference, too." 

In these words Mr. Bellew showed his inti- 
mate knowledge of girl nature, and also his 
sympathy with its ro manticism . 

"It's all wrong," he went on, "the way peo- 
ple talk of the matinee girl and her folly. 
I've seen lots of good, wholesome, clever girls 
dead in love with a hero, — not with the actor 

who played him, but with the hero, — and the 

275 



276 The Crime of Silence 

poor fool of a conceited actor misunderstood 
the whole affair. 

''A little slip of a girl, with her head full of 
fairy tales, goes to the matinee. She lives at 
home with a father who reads the paper all the 
time he's in the house, and her only brother 
never notices her at all, except to tweak her 
hair or make fun of all her timid ideas. 

''When the hero appears the little girl is elec- 
trified. 'Here,' she thinks, 'here's the kind of 
man I've dreamed of. He fears nothing, he 
loves with all his heart, he doesn't laugh at the 
idea of a locket and a ring. Why, he'd die for 
a lock of his lady's hair.' And she sits and 
dreams and dreams, dear little goose." 

Unfortunately not all actors, nor does the 
public generally, see the sometimes silly con- 
duct of the matinee girl in its true light. Girls 
are often severely blamed and criticized for ac- 
tions and words which are merely the expres- 
sion of hero worship or romantic idealism. 
But it is true, too, that there are many girls 
who overstep the limits of good behavior, and 
leave themselves open to well deserved criti- 
cism. 

The freedom accorded to girls to-day, as 



Perils of the New Freedom 277 

compared with the restraints imposed upon 
their sisters of half or a quarter of a century 
ago, is often responsible for this. Indeed, it is 
safe to say that, until she is protected by the 
knowledge that will save her from the snares 
and pitfalls of life, the larger liberty the mod- 
ern girl enjoys is, in many instances, a source 
of danger. The fact that our girls go out 
into the world with very little training and few 
suggestions regarding the risks they run in 
mingling with men in business life of whom 
they know practically nothing; the mother's 
fatal failure to instruct her daughter regarding 
the possible curse of the first kiss, the first cock- 
tail, or the slightest f amiharity has often led to 
sorrow and shame. 

How little the average girl realizes what she 
is doing when she drinks cocktails with men, 
even at a respectable hotel or restaurant. The 
first cocktail, the fkst kiss, or the first embrace 
is often the very gateway to perdition. 

Not long ago I heard a man reprove a girl 
companion veTv sharply because she refused to 
drink a cocktail. She told him that she 
thought her mother would not like it, to which 
the man retorted that, if she ever expected to 



278 The Crime of Silence 

have a good time in life, she would have to be 
a ''good fellow." 

Who can estimate the human tragedies that 
have resulted from getting such false notions 
of comradeship as this ! Trying to be a "good 
fellow" has opened the door to ruin for multi- 
tudes of young girls. 

Many a light-hearted girl without the slight- 
est idea of doing wrong goes motoring with a 
comparative stranger and does not even hesi- 
tate to stop at road houses for refreshments. 
Or she will attend the theatre without a 
chaperone and afterwards go to wine suppers, 
at which she is exposed to all sorts of dangers 
of which she is totally ignorant. 

Most mothers trust their daughters too im- 
plicitly even to think they could ever be led 
astray, no matter what company they are 
thrown in. It is true that a pure heart and 
/the power of self-control, backed by wise train- 
1 ing, will protect any girl under almost any cir- 
cumstances anywhere in the world. But how 
many girls are so protected ? And how many 
mothers have any idea of the perils which their 
daughters are constantly encountering, and 
what narrow escapes many of them have? 



Perils or the New Freedom 279 

How often do we hear ignorant, well-meaning, 
girls who have been unfortunately entangled 
weeping bitter tears of anguish that their 
mothers never told them of the risks of un- 
chaperoned association with men! 

It is a terrible thing to send girls out into the 
world, especially the business world, where they 
come in constant, close contact with men, with- 
out posting them in regard to the special temp- 
tations and perils they will encounter. Par- 
ents might as well expect that lambs would be 
safe in pastures infested with wolves as to send 
ignorant, innocent young girls out among men, 
many of whom are brutal a nd sensua l, and ex- 
pect them to remain unharmed. If any 
human being in this world should be pitied, it 
is an ignorant, unsophisticated girl or young 
woman exposed to its dangerous temptations. 

There is no doubt that the new freedom of 
girls, with much less of the old-time chaperon- 
age, the multiplied opportunities and facilities 
for saying rash things, fool things over the tele- 
phone; the great increase in number of places 
of amusement, such as moving picture shows, 
the hotel and afternoon teas, where dancing is 
indulged in, and especially automobile temp- 



280 The Crime or Silence 

tations — all these things give girls opportunity 
to form unfortunate associations. In other 
words, many of the safeguards formerly 
thrown around a young woman have been re- 
moved, while she has infinitely greater liber- 
ties, with far more temptations to go astray. 

While this new and larger freedom which 
girls (who carry their own night key) all over 
the country are enjoying, and insisting upon, 
will result in great good to those who have 
strong characters and who are fortunate 
enough to have intelligent and helpful mothers, 
it will lead to infinite harm to the weakjiaugh- 
ters of weak mothers, who do not appreciate 
its dangers. 

A New York mother whom I know has been 
driven almost to insanity by the waywardness 
of her seventeen-year-old daughter, who, un- 
der the pretence of calling on friends, goes 
alone to hotel teas and cabare t restau rants, 
where she has formed the acquaintance of ques- 
tionablejnen, with whom she dances and goes 
automobile riding. The girl has become so 
fascinated with the excitement, and what she 
calls the fun of her new liberty, that she pays 
no attention to the warnings of her mother, who 



Perils of the New Freedom 281 

doesn't dare to tell the father, a very stern man, 
lest he should disinherit her. Sometimes this 
girl does not get home until two or three o'clock 
in the morning, or remains out all nigjit with 
her girl chums and then resorts to all sorts 
of deceptions to keep the truth from her fa- 
ther. 

Many girls insist on doing as this one does, 
going out unattended to all sorts of places. 
They meet unprincipled men who invite them 
to the theatre and out riding, often taking them 
to road houses and inducing them to drink wine 
and to smoke cigarettes. Cases have been re- 
ported during the past year of unfortunate, un- 
suspecting girls who have been drugged in 
these places and thus led to their ruin. 

Only the other day I heard a beautiful 
young woman speak of girl friends who, even 
though they were chaperoned at balls and 
dances, would take occasion when they were 
not observed to slip away with young men part- 
ners, and go out motoring, perhaps for anhour 
or two, without being missed or exciting the 
suspicion of their chaperones. 

Now, this is adding deceit to imprudence, 
and it will not be long before girls who indulge 



282 The Crime of Silence 

in escapades of this kind will be drawn into 
others far more serious and more dangerous. 

One would think that the frightful experi- 
ences of girls like Nan Patterson, the Floro- 
dora chorus girl, would be warning enough for 
hundreds of others who are trying to see how 
near they can go to the edge of the precipice 
without falling over. 

The allurements of a gay life, the passion 
for admiration, the love of extravagance and 
show, not the love of wrongdoing, led to the 
ruin of this unfortunate girl, as it is leading to 
that of thousands of others. 

It does not seem possible for any intelligent 
girl to go on doing dangerous things, attend- 
ing champagne-stage suppers, motoring at 
night with men whom she barely knows, and ex- 
posing herself to unspeakable risks without 
realizing where it will all end. But it is a curi- 
ous fact that, when people are in the midst of 
a whirl of dissipation, they are blind to the re- 
sults, they cannot see what others see, what 
others know will be the inevitable outcome. 
The actors in the game seem to be hypnotized. 
They know what has been the result of the 
pace they are going with thousands of others. 



Perils of the New Freedom 283 

but they do not believe it is going to be the 
same with them. It is the old story of the 
young man who drinks. He thinks that he can 
stop drinking any time, can reform when he 
pleases, but everybody else knows that he is 
being grasped more and more firmly in the 
clutches of the tyrant habit, and that every day 
that goes by makes it less and less probable 
that he will ever escape from them. There is 
something about the light and glare, the lure of 
dissipation, which not only makes one blind to 
all its dangers, but also hides from him the 
havoc that it is playing in his life. 

Another danger of the new girl's greater 
freedom is that it tends to make her too inde- 
pendent of other people's opinions. She is apt 
to think that she is just as free as her brother, 
and can do the same things that he does with 
the same impunity, which is practically not 
the case. 

It may be a false standard of ethics, but it 
is unfortunately true that, if a girl is indiscreet 
and happens to make a mistake, if she appears 
at some questionable place, no matter how in- 
nocent she may be of wrongdoing, if she is 
seen with a man who has a bad reputation, she 



284 The Crime of Silence 

is quickly gossiped about and her character as- 
sailed. 

Again, many girls call up men over the tele- 
phone during business hours and talk to them 
as freely as their brothers talk to their men 
friends. After a while they acquire the tele- 
phone habit, the habit of calling up male ac- 
quaintances and saying things to them just be- 
cause they are at a distance which they would 
not think of saying in a letter or if they were 
speaking face to face. We all have more or 
less what we might call long-distance courage ; 
it is so easy to say things over the telephone, 
when one is far away, which modesty and sen- 
sitiveness would restrain one from saying at 
close range. While the telephone has proved 
an untold blessing to millions, it has been the 
undoing of a great many modest, good-inten- 
tioned girls ; and this is especially true of girls 
who were brought up in very strict homes, 
where the parents would not allow them any 
liberties, nor tell them why they considered it 
necessary to be so strict in their surveillance. 

Most girls know that they should not do in- 
discreet things, but thej^^ do not begin to know 
how fatally, how tragically wrong these things 



Perils of the New Freedom 285 

may be. Heedless of public opinion in doing 
foolish or imprudent things, many of them say 
that they don't care what people think or say 
of them. "She did not care what people said," 
would make a fitting epitaph for many a girl 
who has gone wrong. It is not always enough 
to be conscious that we are innocent; not 
enough to know that we do what is right; we 
must not put ourselves in questionable posi- 
tions. Girls should avoid the appearance of 
evil, avoid questionable situations, avoid the 
company of men of known bad character. 
Nor should they carry on silly conversations 
over the telephone with men whom they barely 
know. 

A girl who doesn't care what people say 
about her, does not realize that gossip has a 
multitude of tongues, and that bad things said 
about people are infinitely more contagious 
than good things. She does not realize how 
much her welfare, her success in life depends 
upon what people think of her. No one is in- 
dependent of the opinion of others any more 
than a drop of water in the ocean is independ- 
ent of the other drops. Even the appearance 
of evil should be shunned. 



CHAPTER XVI 

woman's cruelty to woman 

Charity is the brightest star in the Christian's diadem. 

Don't look for the flaws as you go through life. 

And, even when you find them. 
It's wise and kind to be somewhat blind 

And look for the virtues behind them. 

— Ella Wheeler Wilcox. 

But still believe that story wrong 
Which ought not to be true. — Sheridan. 

Then gently scan your brother man. 

Still gentler sister woman; 
Though they may gang a trifle wrang, 

To step aside is human: 
One point must still be greatly dark, 

The moving why they do it; 
And just as lamely can ye mark 

How far, perhaps, they rue it. 

— Robert Burns. 

In a recent investigation by the Woman's 
and Child's Wage Earning Association, it was 
found that a majority of the girls who go 
wrong come from the domestic service. The 

286 



Woman's Cruelty to Woman 287 

chief reasons assigned for this were long hours, 
the monotony of the work, dark, gloomy sleep- 
ing rooms, and no place in which to receive 
company. 

The report will come as a great surprise to 
many, especially to the employers of domestic 
servants and to those who are fond of painting 
in glowing colors the sheltered, fortunate, and, 
on the whole, happy life of the average girl 
who does housework. 

When shop or factory girls complain of low 
wages and long hours, they are asked, by those 
who take this roseate view of the life of house 
servants, why they don't give up their weari- 
some, ill paid toil and work in a family where 
they will be well fed, well housed, and well 
paid; in short, where they will have the com- 
forts of a good home, with no temptations to 
draw them from the straight and narrow path. 

If these good people who think the lives of 
domestic servants are so desirable could only 
take their places, for a week or two, they would, 
in all probability, revise their opinion. If the 
average house mistress only realized how ut- 
terly dependent upon her are her servants for 
their social life, their opportunities for recrea- 



288 The Crime of Silence 

tion, for development, for anything that is 
bright and cheerful in their lives, her attitude 
toward them might be very different. 

I would not imply that all mistresses are in- 
different to, and have no thought or care for, 
the welfare and happiness of their servants. 
Nor would I suggest that all servants are un- 
happy and discontented. Far from it. There 
are some kind and thoughtful mistresses, some 
happy and contented maids. But, without en- 
tering upon a discussion of the much debated 
servant question, the report of the investigation 
committee of the Woman's and Child's Wage 
Earning Association would certainly indicate 
that thoughtless mistresses and discontented 
maids are in the majority. 

Can we wonder, when we stop to think how 
little encouragement, inspiration or apprecia- 
tion the average domestic servant gets out of 
her work, which is usually dreary, monotonous 
drudgery? 

The pathetic side of the whole servant prob- 
lem, which has been before the public so long, 
is that the girls in domestic work are shut out, 
practically, from human relationship. They 
have little or no opportunity for social inter- 



Woman's Cruelty to Woman 289 

course, for clean companionship with the op- 
posite sex. They meet their male acquaint- 
ances or friends under unfavorable, often dan- 
gerous conditions. The very lack of a proper 
place to receive friends or callers makes their 
social life abnormal. 

How would you feel, you mistresses, who are 
often so hard and unsympathetic with your 
servants, if your own daughter had to receive 
her men friends in a dingy kitchen, with noth- 
ing but hard, wooden chairs to sit on, and per- 
haps not enough of these? Suppose she was 
not even allowed to receive callers in the 
kitchen, and could only stand out in the alley- 
way or go with them to a public park, or meet 
them in cheap dance halls ! Would you not be 
unhappy and miserable about her? You for- 
get that your servant girls have just the same 
longing for affection, the same yearning for a 
home of their own, the same desire for social 
intercourse as your daughter, 

Kipling says: ''The Colonel's lady and 
Judy O' Grady are sisters under their skin." 
Whether in a palace or a hovel, in the breast 
of a fine lady or that of a poor working girl, the 
human heart has the same craving, the same 



290 The Crime of Silence 

desire for love, companionship. The human 
mind, without distinction of class or race, is so 
constituted that it must have variety ; our pas- 
sions, longings and desires all clamor for ex- 
pression, and if they are denied, there is star- 
vation going on in the nature. How can you 
expect your servants to be normal when their 
whole life is one-sided; when manv sides of 
their nature, those which you are constantly de- 
veloping and feeding in yourself, are practi- 
cally never appealed to in them? Their 
pent-up desires, their yearnings, whatever they 
may be, are unexpressed, and these feelings are 
dangerous when thus repressed, for they will 
seek an outlet in other directions, often in for-/ 
bidden ways. / 

Mrs. Mary Hutton Pell, recognizing the 
importance of this seldom considered phase of 
the question, has solved it entirely to her own 
satisfaction and that of her servants. In a re- 
cent interview on the subject she said, ''People 
are all the time wailing about the servant prob- 
lem, but they never try to solve the question. 
Nothing has ever been done for the domestic 
servant. Workers in all other hues have been 



Woman's Cruelty to Woman 291 

helped in various ways; the shop girl, the fac- 
tory workers have amusements provided for 
them, different kinds of welfare work have 
been organized for them, but there is never 
anything for the domestic servant. Instead 
of helping the servants, we degrade them. — 
There is no other class of workers whose gen- 
eral condition has such an important bearing 
upon family life, and there are no other work- 
ers so little known. We never think of doing 
anything for their amusement or seeing that 
they have any diversion." 

Another progressive woman, Mrs. Ellen 
Trask, says : ''It is not so much the maids who 
need training as the mistresses. Women have 
for so long a time kept their housemaids in a 
state of semi -bondage that they cannot seem to 
realize that it may be possible to alter the con- 
ditions in some way that will give satisfaction 
to both. 

''It is easy to train young girls to be good 
housekeepers. It is the natural work of 
women, and many of them love it. But, so 
long as girls are expected to be inmates night 
and day of some other woman's home, no 



292 The Crime of Silence 

matter how luxurious it may be or how well 
they may be treated, the problem will remain a 
problem. 

''Is there any other work where the employee 
is expected to be under the constant super- 
vision of her employer? If only some one can 
devise a way to bring the two into more equable 
relations with each other, there will be hope of 
solving the problem. 

"We don't need to have ignorant girls fresh 
from a foreign country in our homes. We can 
have intelligent girls, trained in our own 
schools, if we make the conditions right for 
them. Shall we continue in the old way, or 
shall we use the same intelligence which- is used 
in the suffrage problem and find the remedy?" 

One of the chief troubles in this whole ques- 
tion is that the average mistress forgets, in 
dealing with her maids, that ''man does not live 
by bread alone," and that even where the ma- 
terial conditions are all right there is a human, 
a social side to the girls who work in her home 
V that clamors for recognition, for expression. 
While society is pushing onward in every other 
direction, and education is lifting the humble 
and lowly born to positions of honor and great 



Woman's Cruelty to Woman 293 

responsibility, this side of the servant problem 
remains where it was. There is no hopeful 
outlook, no chance of advancement in the life 
of the houseworker, and women can not shirk 
responsibility for this. They are largely to 
blame, and, until they recognize the social 
rights of the domestic class, their equality, at 
least on broad human lines, with themselves, 
the servant problem will remain unsolved. 
Mistresses must also take their share of re- 
sponsibility for the fall of so many girls in this 
class. 

What are the chances, for example, that a 
really intelligent servant girl, who, perhaps has 
come out of a good home in the country, will, 
under the conditions of her new life in the aver- 
age city home, meet a man whom she would 
care to marry? Her very situation prejudices 
the men who are her equals. Her very lack of 
opportunity probably bars her from making a 
suitable marriage. She realizes this, and it is 
especially brought home to her when she feels 
that she is getting along in years; that, per- 
haps, her attractiveness is being burned up over 
the cook stove and wasted over the washtub; 
and that she is growing prematurely old 



294 The Crime or Silence 

because her girlhood is being crushed out from 
lack of recreation, from the unvarying monot- 
ony of her long daily routine. 

Is it strange that girls thus circumstanced 
grasp even at the counterfeit of love, that 
which comes nearer than anything else in their 
lives to resembling the real affection which 
they crave? They drift from their cold, dark, 
ugly quarters to where there is at least life and 
activity. Though degrading, there is some- 
thing human in it for which their natures are 
starving. They do not yet know all its awful 
wretchedness. They have not yet drunk the 
bitterest dregs from their cup. 

"Man's inhumanity to man makes countless 
thousands mourn," says Burns; but what of 
woman's inhumanity to woman? 

Woman's cruelty to woman is responsible 
for a great many domestic servants drifting 
into disreputable houses. Women generally 
have accepted the double standard established 
by man, with its exoneration of the male 
wrongdoer and ostracism of the woman. 

Some one has said that "no one else can be so 
hard as a good woman," and in the case of a 
fallen sister this is, alas! too often true. I 



Woman's Cruelty to Woman 295 

have heard good women condemn in the harsh- 
est and bitterest terms young girls who were 
led astray in the first instance by men old 
enough to be their fathers, in some instances, 
their grandfathers, with never a word of blame 
for the men. 

When a husband, a son, or a brother goes 
wrong, where does the wife, the mother, or the 
sister place the blame? Is it not invariably on 
"the other woman," that ''horrid" other woman 
who tempted the poor, helpless innocent man! 
How could a grandfather, or father, protect 
himself from the wiles of that young Delilah? 
It was she who tempted him, and he did, like 
Adam, ''eat of the forbidden fruit." No mat- 
ter if Delilah be but fifteen, and Samson be 
fifty, no matter if his long experience in hypno- 
tizing innocent girls (whose mothers had never 
posted them regarding their own sex nature) 
placed the young girl at a criminal disadvan- 
tage, it is she who should have known better, 
she who should have been able to withstand 
temptation, she who should have shown herself 
of the stronger sex, not of the weaker. Her 
passions? Why, she has none, — or, at least, 
according to man's theory regarding her, — 



296 The Crime of Silence 

which women have meekly accepted, — she 
should have none. It is the man only who has 
passions to fight, temptations to conquer. 
The woman is simply weak and vicious; she 
acts out of pure wantonness ! 

Women have certainly learned well the les- 
son that has been taught them for centuries, 
that began with our father Adam, when, after 
enjoying his apple, he tried to shield himself 
from the anger of his Lord by putting all the 
blame for their joint disobedience on our poor 
Mother Eve, — ''The woman did tempt me and 
I did eat!" 

So when a woman discovers that a servant 
has been betrayed by her lover (often because 
she had no decent place in which to receive her 
male friends), instead of protecting the girl, 
trying to help her out of a trouble which she 
feels will ruin her life, instead of trying to 
shield her by getting a place for her in the 
country or in a hospital, she turns her out with 
abusive language, telling her that she is unfit 
to associate with human beings. 

If there is ever a time when a girl who is 
alone in the world, whose very longing for af- 
fection, for some one to love her, has, perhaps. 



Woman's Cruelty to Woman 297 

led her into trouble, needs the sympathy, the 
protection, the shielding which her mistress 
could give her, it is when she is in this condi- 
tion. 

Is it any wonder that so many of these 
frightened, friendless girls, who dare not whis- 
per their trouble to any human being, commit 
suicide, or that they become objects of pubhc 
charity, or, when they leave the hospital, drift 
through the onty door that seems open to them? 

Frank Moss, Assistant District Attorney of 
New York, tells a pathetic story of a Ger- 
man girl who was living with Wolter, the de- 
generate murderer of Ruth Wheeler, the fif- 
teen-year-old girl whom he lured to his rooms 
by an advertisement for a stenographer. 
When summoned as a witness in the murder 
trial, this German girl, in answer to the ques- 
tion w^hether she loved Wolter, said ''Yes." 
''Then you will probably not tell the truth 
about him," said Mr, Moss. "The truth?" she 
cried. "I must tell the truth whatsoever the 
results," and she did. 

After the trial Mr. Moss said he was so af- 
fected by the girl's honesty and pitied her so in 
her awful phght that he asked her if she could 



298 The Crime of Silence 

not go to friends or relatives when she had 
^ testified and was released from the House of 
\ Detention. "No, Mr. Moss/' replied the girl, 
''I have not a friend in America who would 
shield me or do anything for me." The kind- 
hearted lawyer involuntarily kissed her hand, 
and told her ''You have one friend left." He, 
with others, assisted her to get a position, and 
every little while she reported at his office. 

After a few months she came to him one day 
with her little son in her arms, accompanied by 
a big, robust Gcexman, who said he wanted to 
marry her. Mr. Moss asked the man if he 
knew her history. He said he did, but that 
he loved her and wanted to make her his wife. 
The pair were married, and the District At- 
torney, with Mr. Moss and all the other as- 
sistant attorneys, attended the wedding. A 
short time after the husband came to the Dis- 
trict Attorney's office and told him that he 
wanted legally to adopt his wi fe's boy , to edu- 
cate him, and bring him up right. 

Tens of thousands of girls could be rescued 
as this German girl was if they only had a 
little friendly sympathy and the aid of good 
people. But they are cruelly and almost 



Woman's Cruelty to Woman 299 

criminally treated as outcasts by the very peo- 
ple who could help them. 

It is doubtful if any normal girl ever goes 
willingly into a vicious life with the least idea 
of remaining in it. But, unfortunately, when 
girls once get into it, they very rarely leave it. 
A sense of shame and the gradual loss of self- 
respect undermine their will power ; and, when 
they realize that it would be almost impossible 
to face the world again, when almost every- 
body shuns, scorns and denounces the girl who 
has made a mistake, they give themselves up 
for lost. 

The totally wrong view society takes of this 
whole question is responsible for thousands of 
girls remaining in an evil life when they long 
to get away from their horrible experiences. 
They know how they would be despised by so- 
ciety; that there would be no chance for them 
again in the world outside ; and they think all 
they can do is to continue to live in the under- 
world and to get as much out of their wretched 
life as possible. People outside know nothing 
of the terrible suffering of these girls, the tor- 
turing existence they lead, especially during 
the first months of their debauchery. Every 



300 The Crime of Silence 

day, until their self-respect has died out of 
them, many of them cry their hearts out for 
the sight, the caress of loved ones whom they 
will never see again. 

Happily there are signs of a widespread 
awakening in regard to this whole question 
of sexual immorality. The tendency is to be 
more merciful to the woman who has gone 
wrong and to put the chief blame where, in 
most cases, it belongs, on the man. While the 
conservative, the narrow-minded and the igno- 
rant still cling to the prescribed masculine 
ethics of the double standard, with its blind in- 
justice and immorality, progressive women, 
women of education and intelligence, are being 
aroused to a sense of the iniquity of the tradi- 
tional attitude toward the fallen woman. 
They are taking, rather, the attitude of Eliz- 
abeth Fry in her work among the women in 
English prisons a century ago. These unfor- 
tunates worshipped that noble Quaker lady, 
and a friend visiting Newgate one day in 
company with her, being struck by the affec- 
tionate manner of the prisoners toward her, 
inquired for what crimes the women had been 



Woman's Cruelty to Woman 301 

convicted. ''I do not know/' was the reply. 
"I have never asked them that. We all have 
come short." 

Women's clubs, Social Settlements, Rescue 
Homes, the Salvation Army, and great bodies 
of Church workers all over the country are do- 
ing an immense amount of good in rescuing 
women and girls from lives of shame and put- 
ting them in positions where they will be self- 
supporting and free from temptations. 

At a recent meeting of clubwomen, members 
of the Salvation Army and other social work- 
ers in New York, to establish additional facili- 
ties for rescue work, Mrs, Robbins Lau re- 
marked, ''Men have said that woman's worst 
enemy is woman. It is possible that this re- 
buke was merited in the past, but I believe the 
clubwomen of New York are now making an 
honest effort to remove the cause of the re- 
proach." 

Mrs. William Grant Brown, another well- 
known clubwoman who spoke at the meeting, 
said: "At some remote period men may be 
depended upon absolutely to respect the purity 
of women, but until that time arrives we must 



302 The Crime of Silence 

try to do something to repair the injury done 
through the wickedness of men and the frailty 
of their victims." 

But it was Brigadier Brown, of the Salva- 
tion Army, who touched the most vital part of 
the matter, and, even at the risk of unduly 
dwelling on this phase of the question, I cannot 
forbear quoting her in part. ''The most ag- 
gravating problem which confronts us in this 
work," she said, ''is how to keep our daughters 
safe after they have been rescued. You know 
the world is very cruel. It is cruel without in- 
tending to be so. In its indifference it often 
inflicts mortal wounds, and the girl who has en- 
dured struggles and gone through trials which 
are known only to her class often succumbs. 

"In sickness she has nowhere to go, and 
when thrown out of employment she is at a 
greater disadvantage than is she who has never 
violently fractured the moral law. 

"Of course the Salvation Army does not be- 
lieve in coddling or nursing the unfortunate or 
the wrongdoer. We peremptorily insist on 
everybody working. We believe work is ab- 
solutely necessary to the construction and 
preservation of a morally healthy as well as a 



Woman's Cruelty to Woman 303 

physically healthy citizenship. But how nice 
it would be for a girl who has taken a wayward 
step to be assured that she has a heart and a 
home to come to in case of dire need!" 

Too much cannot be said in praise of the 
rescue work that is being done by many de- 
voted women all over the country. But our 
great aim must be total abolition of sexual vice, 
— -the prevention of immorality rather than 
healing its ravages. 

Employers can do a great deal to stem the 
tide of immorality which statisticians have 
found in the domestic field. There is a move- 
ment on foot for the rehabilitation and uplift 
of the workers in this most conservative and 
tradition-bound of all fields of employment. 
Mistresses on the one hand, and maids on the 
other, are forming organizations for a general 
campaign of betterment. More and better 
education along scientific lines for the maids; 
more consideration, and better provision for 
their social needs on the part of the mistresses, 
is the slogan of this movement. We need bet- 
ter educated, better trained women in this most 
important branch of social service. We shall 
get them when the relations of mistress and 



304 The Crime of Silence 

maid, or rather employer and employee, are on 
a different basis, and the hours of work are 
regulated and systematized as they are in all 
other legitimate businesses. Then the social 
stigma that attaches to domestic work will be 
removed, and the domestic employee will take 
her proper place as one of the most useful and 
important of all public or private servants. 

Who made the heart, 'tis He alone 

Decidedly can try us. 
He knows each chord, — ^its various tone. 

Each spring, — its various bias: 
Then at the balance let's be mute. 

We never can adjust it; 
What's done we partly may compute, 

But know not what's resisted, — Robert Burns. 



CHAPTER XVII 

THE DAMNABLE DOUBLE STANDARD 

There is no sex in morals. 

Whatever is morally right for a man to do is morally right 
for a woman to do; I recognize no rights but human rights. 

— Angelina Grimke Weld. 

Recently, we are told, a woman standing 
high in the social circles of her city crossed off 
the names of two young men from her invita- 
tion list. The action was bound to be noticed, 
and it was. Several friends went to her and 
pleaded for the young men. ''Of course it is 
unfortunate," they argued, ''that they are not 
just what they should be, but you are very 
likely to drive them farther toward ruin by 
your action in so publicly calling attention to 
their habits by excluding them from your so- 
cial affairs." The social leader listened. 
"No," she said, firmly, "you are wrong. We 
have all been wrong in opening the doors of our 
houses to them. I warned both of them that 
I would do this if they did not mend their ways ; 

305 



306 The Crime or Silence 

and, while they listened respectfully, they went 
right on. For the sake of my own two daugh- 
ters, and the daughters of other mothers who 
come to my house, my doors are closed to 
them." The woman's stand had the effect of 
helping more timid and wavering mothers, and 
before the season was over practically every 
door was closed to the young men. 

If all women would unite in taking the stand 
adopted by this social leader toward male sex- 
ual sinners, the most damnable feature of our 
civilization, the double standard of morals, 
which makes a woman an outcast for the im- 
morality which is overlooked in a man, would 
soon be a thing of the past. 

It seems almost incredible that this vilely un- 
just standard should have endured so long; 
that, in Christian countries, among the follow- 
ers of that Christ who so clearly condemned it, 
a man should be socially ostracized for com- 
paratively minor criminal offences, yet be rot- 
ten with sexual immorality and still have access 
to the best homes; while a woman who makes 
the least false step in this direction should be- 
come a pariah. 

Is there any colorable pretext for such a dis- 



The Damnable Double Standard 307 

tinction? Are the effects of impurity in a man 
less disastrous than in a woman? Is there any 
sex in principle? Is there any reason why a 
man should have license to drag himself 
through licentious mire any more than a 
woman? A thousand times, no! It would be 
loosening the very foundations of virtue to 
countenance the notion that, because of the dif- 
ference in sex, men are at libertj^ to set morality 
at defiance and to do with impunity that which, 
if done by women, would stain the latter's char- 
acter and make them outcasts forever. All 
right-minded people must agree with Ange- 
lina Grimke Weld that ''whatever is morally 
right for a man to do is morally right for a 
woman to do ; I recognize no rights but human 
rights." 

It is because human rights have been ignored 
in the past, because one sex has arrogated all 
rights, all power, to itself, and dominated the 
other sex, that we have the absurd and mon- 
strous paradox of a double standard of morals. 

In the past, human society has been man- 
made, with the exception of a little dash here 
and there of the feminine which woman has 
been allowed to slip in because it favored man's 



308 The Crime of Silence 

own pleasures. Because they have had the 
power, men have always made a great distinc- 
tion between male and female sex offenders. 
They have always sought security for their own 
moral lapses. They are responsible for the 
wicked difference in public opinion regarding 
the sins of the two sexes, — for the unjust sex 
distinction which has encouraged and promoted 
immorality and given license to vice through 
all the centuries. 

Discussing the status of woman in China and 
its underlying causes, Prof. E. A. Ross, in his 
remarkable book, ''The Changing Chinese," 
might be quoted almost literally in describing 
the causes responsible for the double standard 
of morals, with all its attendant evils, in Christ- 
ian countries. 

"Balancing their burdens against those of the 
men, it is clear that the laws governing wom- 
an's life are not for the sake of society or the 
race so much as for the male sex. In its every 
chapter Chinese culture is man-made and be- 
trays the native male viewpoint. Although 
necessary, woman is inferior and must be held 
under firm control. The sages stressed the 
danger of letting women become educated and 



The Damnable Double Standard 309 

go about freely, for thus might women gain 
the upper hand and wreck society. 

''From the male viewpoint it is fitting that 
woman be sacrificed to man, but not that man 
be sacrificed to woman. . • • 

"The wife guilty of unfaithfulness is to be 
stoned, drowned, or hanged. ... If a husband 
be found unfaithful,, his wife has a right to 
scold him good and hard, and he ought not to 
beat her for it, either. 

''Nothing could be plainer than that woman's 
lot in China is not of her own fashioning, but 
has been shaped by male tastes and prejudices, 
without regard to what women themselves 
think about it. The men have determined 
woman's sphere as well as man's. The ancient 
sages — all men, — ^molded the institutions that 
bear upon women, and it is male comment, not 
really public opinion, that enforces the con- 
ventionalities that crush her. By wit, will, or 
worth, the individual woman may slip from un- 
der the thumb of the individual man, — there 
are many such cases, — but never could the sex 
free itself from the domination of the male sex. 
The men had all the artillery, — the time-hal- 
lowed teachings and institutions, — and all the 



310 The Crime or Silence 

small arms, — current opinion and comment. 
Cribbed and confined, the women were with- 
out schooling, locomotion, acquaintance, con- 
versation, stimulus, contact with affairs, access 
to ideas, or opportunity to work out their own 
point of view." 

But even in the tradition-bound Orient, as 
well as throughout Christendom, the women 
are rebelling against man-made laws ; they are 
demanding that they be governed by the same 
civil and moral codes that apply to men. They 
are insisting on a higher, cleaner, purer stand- 
ard of society than that which obtained in the 
past, a standard to which men shall measure 
up as well as women, or be ostracized, even as 
women have been ostracized for not living up 
to the standard established for them by men. 

The leaven of the feminine ideal, which is 
slowly gaining admission into the life of the 
world, is already working a mighty revolution 
in society. Woman's activities in the modern 
world are hastening the evolution of the race 
to higher levels. 

There was a time when polygamy was not 
only universal but was also respected. We 
read in Holy Writ that the wise King Solomon 



The Damnable Double Standard 311 

had a thousand wives. All through the Old 
Testament references are made to the numer- 
ous wives of men. Many things were allowed 
in the early history of the race which would not 
be tolerated to-day. More and more, as 
woman climbs to her rightful place, that as- 
signed her at the beginning by the Creator, 
does man tend to become a higher and nobler 
being. 

A century ago the mistresses of kings and 
emperors ruled the courts of the world. Rul- 
ers carried on their amours openly, in defiance 
of all the ideals of morality or decency. High 
government officials were obliged to recognize 
their favorites and bow to their tremendous so- 
cial and political power. 

The rulers of to-day must at least preserve 
the appearance of morality. They must cover 
up their intrigues, hide them from the world, 
thus showing a little respect for public opinion 
and an improvement in the ideal of masculine 
morals. A hundred years ago men in general 
led immoral lives much more openly than at 
present. These things are more and more cov- 
ered and carried on in secret, showing the grow- 
ing change in society's view not only of sexual 



312 The Crime of Silence 

immorality but also of all other forms of ^dce. 
Men are being forced to clean up their lives in 
every direction. Compare, for example, the 
drinking habits of men in public life to-day 
with those of the corresponding classes of a 
hundred years ago. It was a common thing 
for great lawyers of that time to be so drunk at 
important trials that they would scarcely know 
what they were doing. Urgent cases would 
sometimes have to be postponed until the legal 
lights had recovered from their debauches. It 
was the usual thing for liquors to be kept in 
stores and all sorts of places of business for em- 
ployers and employees. Clergymen, deacons 
and other officials of the church often drank to 
excess. At public dinners and on other public 
occasions it was not unusual for men to drink 
until they fell under the table, and the man 
who could drink the most men under the table 
was looked up to by the others as a superior 
man. 

It is not necessary to go back even so far to 
accentuate the marked change in social stand- 
ards. It is not very long since our public men 
would brag about the large number of their 
illicit sex relations and boast of debauching 



The Damnable Double Standard 313 

innocent girls. Gambling was universal, and 
it was a common thing for members of our na- 
tional congress and senate to stagger to their 
seats. They would often have to be removed 
in a state of beastly intoxication. 

For centuries the sowing of wild oats by 
youths and young men was considered justifi- 
able, even necessaiy for a well-poised, virile 
youth. It was thought that every boy who was 
going to make a real man "must have his fling." 
Indeed, because of the beastliness of men in the 
earlier history of the race for ages, the mutual 
loyalty of men and women was thought prac- 
tically impossible. .But, as the race rises 
higher in the scale of civilization, these ideals 
and practices are passing away and higher and 
purer standards of morals and conduct are tak- 
ing their place. 

''There was a long era when the separate 
standard of morals for the two sexes was ac- 
cepted by all good people," says Ella Wheeler 
Wilcox. " 'Boys will be boys' was the ex- 
treme of criticism passed on a fallen boy, but 
any girl who lost her reputation was shunned 
and shut from all respectable circles save the 



314 The Crime of Silence 

back pews of a church, where she must go 
veiled, and the only doors open to her were 
those of the convent, the Magdalene Home, or 
the tomb. But the world has changed might- 

ily." 

Yes, the world has changed wonderfully, it 
is true; but the double standard, being the 
strongest and most firmly entrenched of man- 
made social canons, is, naturally, one of the 
most difficult to displace; and, as it is the one 
that has wrought most evil in society, so its 
complete abolition will do more to lift man- 
kind to a higher plane than any other social re- 
form. 

The evils of this double standard — which 
should be properly called a code of morality 
for women and of immorality for men, — have 
hitherto been carefully concealed from those 
whom they most injured, but the great femi- 
nine movement, the awakening of woman, the 
revelations of sociologists, — all these are bring- 
ing them to light, and light is death to all evil. 
In her remarkable book, 'Tlain Facts About 
a Great Evil," Miss Christabel Pankhurst has 
turned such a flood of illumination on this, 



The Damnable Double Standard 315 

the greatest of all social evils, that there can 
no longer be any excuse for ignoring it or try- 
ing to cover it up. 

Jhe intelligent, p ro,^r^ssiv^ womm ^i the \ 
world are rising up in protest against the in- 1 
suit it perpetually offers to their womanhood/ 
They are demanding that the social cancer be 
cured or cut out. They will no longer shut 
their eyes to the existence of wickedness be- 
cause it is practised in secrecy. It must be 
abolished. The chief thing that troubled the 
immoral man in the past was that his irmnoral- 
ity should be found out. Women are no 
longer satisfied with the covering up of evil. 
They are going to insist that it be rooted out, 
that men shall be morally clean. Every intel- 
ligent, virtuous girl is going to demand that the 
man who goes to the altar with her shall go 
there as clean as he demands that she shall go ; 
and, if he doesn't, she will not go. If he goes 
at all, he will have to go with a woman of his 
own class ; one with whom he has secretly con- 
sorted but whom he has openly despised. In 
the future it is going to be impossible for an 
impure man to marry on a moral plane infi- 
nitely above his own, as he has done in the past. 



316 The Crime or Silence 

It is also going to be impossible for him to 
rob a woman of that which is more precious to 
her than life itself, and then cast her off as a 
child discards a broken toy without any fear of 
being called to account by society. The man 
who would think it a disgrace not to pay a 
gambling debt, or a debt of ''honor/' so-called, 
but would not hesitate for a moment to aban- 
don a poor girl whom he had ruined and who 
would not feel the slightest sense of respon- 
sibility for the unfortunate child he had 
brought into life and branded with illegitimacy 
— this sort of man will not be known in the 
future. 

Hitherto boys have been brought up to think 
that they can do with impunity things that it 
would be unthinkable for their sisters to do. 
The idea of the inferiority of women has been 
so strongly imprinted on their consciousness 
that it has utterly confused in their minds the 
distinction between right and wrong in matters 
of sex. 

I know a boy who treats his sisters as if they 
were nobodies, and is constantly taunting them 
with his superiority, reminding them that they 
are girls and that they are not supposed to 



The Damnable Double Standard 317 

have the same rights and privileges as men. 
''Don't you know that girls can't do this sort of 
thing?" is a favorite expression of his to his 
sisters. He not only has a certain scorn for 
them, but even for his mother, because his 
father has always treated the women of his 
family as if they were inferior beings. The 
boy defers to his father and to older men in 
everything, but he has little respect for women, 
especially when it comes to a question of opin- 
ion or judgment on important matters. 

Boys and girls in the majority of families 
have become so accustomed to the expressions, 
— ''Oh, he is a boy, and you laiow boys must 
have their liberty; they can't be sissies," and 
"Oh, she is a girl, and she must be infinitely 
more careful than boys. She can not do this 
and she can not do that, because she is a girl," — 
that they have come to draw a sharp distinction 
between the moral standards of the sexes. 
They have come to think that men can do many 
things without blame which it would be sinful 
and wicked for girls to do. They see that 
boys can drink and indulge in all other sorts 
of immorality and still maintain a good stand- 
ing in society, while girls who should dare to do 



318 The Crime oe Silence 

such things would be condemned, despised and 
banished from the society of all pure, decent 
people. ' 

This pernicious distinction in the moral train- 
ing of youth is responsible for the unfortunate 
impression among the young men of to-day 
that, even if they have sown their wild oats, 
even if they have been guilty of all sorts of in- 
discretions, they can come to the marriage altar 
without any compunction or remorse for their 
sins, for the broken laws of chastity, which 
they expect their chosen life partner to have 
kept inviolate. 

This one-sided training is entirely due to 
man-made social laws, to man's views of the 
sex question, which have always been colored 
by his own interests, his own selfish, brutal de- 
sires. In his assumption of superiority he has 
demanded absolute purity in the woman he has 
married, while he has considered it all right to 
give his polluted self in exchange for the un- 
tarnished chastity of his bride. 

The vicious double standard prevents many 
men from marrying, not because they think 
they are unfit, but because bachelorhood allows 
them greater license. 



The Damnable Double Standard 319 

Among the thousands of young men in our 
cities who, financially, are in splendid position 
to marry, there are many who do not hesitate 
to say that they do not need to, because they 
have more freedom and can get more out of 
life by remaining single. 

Not long ago I asked one of this class, a 
young man with a very fair income and a splen- 
did outlook, why he did not marry and have a 
home of his own. "Well," he replied, ''it 
doesn't really pay ; and, after all, what is there 
in it for me ? In New York a man can always 
get a girl when he wants one, and he doesn't 
have to bother with her when he doesn't want 
her!" 

He added that, if he wished to go to Europe, 
he could pack his trunk at night and take the 
steamer the next morning without any one to 
object, or any one to consult ; and that he could 
live in a bachelor apartment, have his valet to 
take care of him, eat in the best hotels or 
restaurants, have a good time whenever and 
wherever he wanted, and be free from all re- 
sponsibility of wife or children. 

In many cases the utter selfishness of such 
men, their manner of living, their immoral 



320 The Crime of Silence 

practices, have disqualified them for ever being 
really in love with women. They have so long 
violated, outraged, and debauched that sacred 
sentiment, the love instinct, that they have be- 
come immune to it. Their only desire in re- 
gard to women is the gratification of their ani- 
mal instincts, and they know that, whether 
married or single, society in general will wink 
at their immoral practices. 

But the day is fast coming when the same 
treatment that is accorded immoral women will 
be meted out to immoral men. 

A new ideal of the coming man, the coming 
woman, is being formed in the public mind to- 
day. A new vista regarding the possibilities 
of the child is opening out to humanity. In 
the coming time we shall have no sowers of 
wild oats, and no reapers, because the double 
standard of morals will not be tolerated. 

The new woman is going to guard the very 
^ates of life as has never been done in the past. 
She is not going to be satisfied to take a life 
partner without at least as much physical ex- 
amination as is required in taking out a life 
insurance policy, or as is demanded by the gov- 
ernment in recruiting soldiers and sailors for 



^1 



The Damnable Double Standard 321 

the army and navy. The new woman will cut 
of from her visiting list all douhle-standard 
men, the sort of men who to-day live dual lives, 
who habitually wallow in moral filth, yet are re- 
ceived in good society and are allowed even by 
mothers to associate with their pure, innocent 
daughters. 

The great scientist, Alfred Russel Wallace, 
in his recent book, ''Social Environment and 
Moral Progress," predicts that the position of 
woman in the not distant future will be far 
higher and more important than any she has 
ever occupied in the past. He says that in the 
future ''she will be placed in a position of re- 
sponsibility and power which will render her 
man's superior, since the future welfare and 
progress of the race will so largely depend 
upon her free choice in marriage.'' 

This will be one of the main results of the 
new and higher morality which will accrue from 
the abolition of the double standard. This in 
turn will be greatly accelerated by the new 
economic independence of woman. As time 
goes on and she gains more and more financial 
independence, it will allow her that freedom 
of choice in marriage which she has never had 



322 The Grime or Silence 

before. This freedom of choice will be 
strengthened and enhanced by the fact that, 
with every new increase of those qualities which 
go to make a higher race, the terrible excess of 
male deaths in boyhood and early manhood will 
gradually disappear, and, instead of the pres- 
ent majority of women in the world, we shall 
have a majority of men. This will lead to a 
greater rivalry for wives, and will give to 
woman the power to reject all the lower types 
of character for the superbest types. 

This does not by any means imply that 
woman is going to supplant man or usurp his 
rights. It simply means that she is going to 
come into her own ; that, instead of walking be- 
hind man, in his shadow, as in the past, she is 
going to pull an even yoke, to walk by his side, 
so that in the future our human government, 
the whole machinery of justice, and our social 
institutions, will have that wholeness and com- 
pleteness, that high standard which can- only 
come through the equal cooperation of the 
sexes. 

The movement for woman suffrage is only 
one phase of the mighty revolution which is go- 
ing on in the woman's world. The vote door 



The Damnable Double Standard 323 

which is now gradually but surely swinging 
open to her in many lands is only one of many 
doors which are already ajar, and through 
which she will soon pass, bringing the race with 
her to a higher plane of morals, manners, and 
living. 

The liquor interests and those that profit 
by vice and immorality of every sort are op- 
posed to woman's suffrage, because they know 
that, when women everywhere are granted the 
power of the ballot, their power to make com- 
mercial profit by pandering to men's baser pas- 
sions will be in jeopardy. 

One of the secrets of the Englishman's bit- 
ter protest against woman's suffrage lies in the 
sex question. When women get the vote in 
England, as elsewhere, they will wipe from the 
statute books the laws that so shamefully dis- 
criminate against their sex, in all questions of 
sexual morality, in favor of men. The age- 
old question of man, ''The woman thou gavest 
me she has sinned. What shall I do with her?" 
will then be changed. Neither morality nor 
justice will be sex-labeled. 

When women are enfranchised, they will not 
long tolerate the heinous injustice of one code 



324 The Crime of Silence 

of morals for women and another and far dif- 
ferent for men. A man's public life, a success- 
ful professional or business career, will not al- 
ways be a cloak for covering a wretched pri- 
vate character. The double standard will go 
when woman has an equal voice with man in 
framing legislation. She will then have infi- 
nitely more influence in the forming of social 
conditions. Women of the future will not per- 
mit their sisters to be exploited and outraged 
to feed the low passions of men. When women 
get the ballot, they will not permit men to hire 
youths openly to debase and ruin young girls. 
They will not tolerate conditions that are likely 
to transmit the poisons of loathsome diseases 
to unborn children to handicap them for life 
with deformities or mental deficiencies. 

It is woman's very instinct to protect the 
home, the children, and she knows that saloons 
and disreputable houses are the worst enemies 
of the home. She knows that they threaten 
the very virtues and hazard the success of her 
children, and who can doubt that she will fight 
for the well-being of those for whom she has 
risked her life? Woman has been an uplifting 
influence in every situation of life, and it is 



The Damnable Double Standard 325 

only natural that she should be the same in poli- 
tics, a field from which she has been arbitrarily 
shut out by the selfishness and meanness of 
men, who flatter her by calling her their su- 
perior, telling her she is an angel, and then in- 
sult her by denying her the very rights they 
claim for themselves ! 

It is a strange thing that man, who has ever 
vaunted himself as the great chivalrous pro- 
tector of woman, should be so cruel to her in 
framing laws against her and in making pub- 
lic sentiment in favor of himself and against 
her in all sex matters. 

This is the great trouble with society to-day. 
The laws are man-made. They are pointed to- 
wards man, fitted for him; and they are en- 
forced or not, just in proportion as they affect 
man's desires. Man alone will not enforce the 
law which he himself wants to break, but any 
woman will insist upon penalizing that which 
she knows debauches her husband and men- 
aces perpetually her children and her home. 
Wherever woman has dominated, she has re- 
fined, elevated, and purified. She has made 
the home the purest, sweetest place on earth; 
and, when she gets the power^ she will certainly 



326 The Crime of Silence 

insist on a clean and equal standard of public 
as well as private morals. 

In Norway, where women have the full 
parliamentary vote, a long delayed measure 
of justice has been accorded the unmarried 
mother and her child. Every illegitimate child 
is insured the right to its father's name and 
property, and the mother is also provided for. 
Compare this with the usual situation in coun- 
tries where men alone make the laws, where the 
unmarried mother and her child are outside the 
pale of the law. 

While I write, the males of Great Britain 
including the Government, the Established 
Church and the Press are gravely discussing 
the question of ''forgiving" the unmarried 
mothers of "war babies," for their lapse from 
virtue, but not a word do we hear about 
"forgiving" the fathers. Oh, no, as usual in 
such matters there is nothing to be forgiven 
them because they are men. But the women 
of England are raising their voices and pro- 
tests as never before, and through their efforts, 
if full responsibility is not brought home to the 
fathers of the unfortunate babies, it is to be 



The Damnable Double Standard 327 

hoped that at least some measure of justice 
will be secured for the mothers. In our coun- 
try, wherever women have succeeded in win- 
ning political rights, the age of consent has 
been raised to eighteen years ; whereas, in most 
places, where men alone make laws, it is still 
between fourteen and sixteen. 

In the past, having had all the power in their 
own hands, men have always stood by one an- 
other in covering up their moral turpitude, and 
in being lenient to their vices. Furthermore, 
male physicians have carefully kept the secrets 
and shielded the reputation of immoral men, 
even when their sins have wrecked their homes, 
made invalids of their wives, and cursed their 
children for life. 

Man's ideal has dominated society in the 
past. Woman's is now coming to the front. 
On every hand, in spite of much sensational 
talking and writing to the contrary, there are 
indications of an upward trend. The univer- 
sal movement for the enfranchisement of 
women, equal education for both sexes, the en- 
trance of women into the so-called learned pro- 
fessions 3,nd especially the steady increase in 



828 The Crime or SiiiENCE 

the ranks of women physicians are all having a 
marked influence in changing public opinion in 
regard to the double standard-^ of morality. 

When women have the full.^-ights of citizen- 
ship and can cast free ballots in every civilized 
State, they will do more in one year to wipe out 
sexual sin and the sin of drink than men have 
done in centuries. In those states of our 
Union where women already vote they turn 
out in great numbers wherever the liquor traf- 
fic, the sweatshop, or the dive has been the 
political issue. Wherever woman has had the 
power, she has turned the light in on the dark 
places and cleaned up things generally. Man 
has been too long without her help in the na- 
tional housekeeping. There is crying need of 
a housecleaning on a vast scale. It is pecu- 
liarly woman's work. Men can never do it 
without her aid. 



THE END 



3477-5 



M 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 








014 130 367 3 



i^m' 



■«*'5^ 










r ■ '''w 







